FELDSWORK 



OF THE YOUNG MEN'S 
CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATIONS 




Book J^tSjS — 



FIELD AND WORK OF THE 

Young Men's Christian Associations 



of 

NORTH AMERICA 



CONTENTS 
1 Association Beginnings - 


Page 


No. 
5 


2 Agencies of Supervision 


and 




Extension 




11 


3 The City Association 


- 


15 


4 With Railroad Men 


. 


19 


5 Work with Students 


- 


25 


6 With Industrial Workers 


- 


35 


7 Rural Work - 


. 


41 


8 With the Men of the A 


rmy 




and Navy . - - 


. 


47 


9 With Colored Men 


. 


53 


10 Religious Work 


' 


59 


1 1 Educational Work - 


. 


67 


12 Physical Work 


- 


73 


13 Work with Boys 

14 Work of the North American 


77 


Associations in Foreign Lands 


83 


15 Conclusion - - . 


- 


93 



1912 

ASSOCIATION PRESS 

124 East 28th Street 

New York 



-1> 




SIR GEORGE WILLIAMS 

Founder of the 
Young Men's Christian Association 

By transfer 
The White House 
1913 



1. a^£fDciation 2Beginning^ 

GEORGE WILLIAMS, the founder of the Young Men's Chris- 
tian Association, was born in Somerset, England, in the year 
1 82 L His father was a prosperous farmer, but the son, show- 
ing no special capacity for farming life, was, after the usual years of 
schooling, apprenticed to a draper (dry-goods dealer) in the nearby 
town of Bridgwater. His family were church people but he himself 
apparently knew little of religion beyond church attendance. Among 
the employees of the Bridgwater establishment were several earnest 
Christian young men, and the example of their useful and happy lives 
resulted in his becoming a sincere and faithful Christian. The few 
years at Bridgwater were filled with religious activity, and with other 
Christian young men George held meetings at which a number of his 
fellow clerks were led into the Christian life. 

In 1841 George Williams, then twenty years of age, went to Lon- 
don and found employment in the drapery house of George Hitchcock 
& Co., 17. St. Paul's Churchyard. In this establishment were eighty 
young men who lodged at night in the small and ill-ventilated bedrooms 
in the store buildings, and who were without any facilities whatever for 
self-improvement. With scarcely an exception these young men were 
profane and profligate, and the earnest-spirited young man found him- 
self in a strange environment, not another professing Christian being 
employed in the house. He prayed for a companion and soon one Hke- 
minded with himself came into the firm's employ. Together they prayed 
and lived their helpful lives and one after another their fellow employees 
were invited into their bedroom meetings for Bible study and prayer. 
Soon others were led into the Christian life, and the bedroom became 
too small. With some measure of fear they asked for the use of a 
larger room. To their surprise their employer cheerfully granted this 



request and from that time became their friend and patron. Aher 
consultation a meeting was called for Thursday evening, June 6, 
1 844, to consider the possibility of extending like efforts to other mer- 
cantile houses. Twelve young men were present and a simple form 
of work was organized under the name "Young Men's Christian As- 
sociation." 

It is interesting to note concerning the twelve founders of the first 
Association that the four principal Protestant evangelical denominations 
of Great Britain were represented among them in equal numbers. 

From the beginning George Williams with his spiritual earnest- 
ness and energy, kept the main objective of the organization clearly to 
the front. It was said of him that when he entered the employ of 
Hitchcock & Co. it was impossible for a clerk in that store to be a 
Christian, and that in three years' time it was impossible for a clerk to 
remain in the employ of the Company and not be a Christian. Mr. 
Hitchcock soon saw the value of this organization among his clerks 
and before long, largely through the influence of George Williams, he 
himself became an earnest Christian. Within a few years George Will- 
iams was admitted to partnership and eventually, on the retirement of 
Mr. Hitchcock, became the head of the firm, which then became known 
as Hitchcock, Williams & Co. In June, 1 894, when George Williams 
was seventy-three years of age, and on the occasion of the fiftieth anni- 
versary of the founding of the Association, he was knighted by the 
Queen of England for "distinguished service in behalf of the young 
manhood of the world." 

Shortly after the organization of the Association in the house of 
Hitchcock & Co., similar societies were established in other London 
dry-goods houses, and in 1 845 T. H. Tarlton was employed as the 
first secretary of the London Association. In 1 85 1 W. E. Shipton 
became the paid secretary and one of his early activities was the distri- 
bution of evangelistic and Association literature during the great Indus- 
trial Exposition held in London that year, and in this way the work of 
the Association became known on the continent of Europe and in the 
United States and Canada. 

The first annual report of the parent Association called attention 



to a new clause in the Constitution, adding to the objective of the Asso- 
ciation an interest in the mental condition of young men. This was the 
beginning of the fundamental idea of the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation that the religion of Jesus Christ through His church is intended to 
save, redeem and develop the whole man — body, soul and spirit — an 
idea which has become dominant in the Christian Church and which 
has found its first organized expression in the Association. 

It is not assumed that the Young Men's Christian Association was 
the first organization formed for advancing the interests of young men. 
In this and in other lands, efforts had been made from time to time, some 
of which had met with considerable success, and more than one society 
thus formed in England, on the Continent and in America has since 
reorganized as a Young Men's Christian Association. 

The Young Men's Christian Associations in the United States and 
Canada are a direct outgrowth of the London work. A letter from 
London, published in a Boston paper, led to the organization of an 
Association in Boston, December 29, 1 85 1 . Twenty-five days before 
this a similar society had been effected in Montreal but of this nothing 
was known in Boston for more than two years. The press of the 
United States gave publicity to the Boston Association and within the 
next two years Associations were formed in twenty American cities, in- 
cluding New York, Chicago, Washington, Buffalo, New Orleans and 
San Francisco. Through the efforts of William Chauncey Langdon of 
the Washington Association, these Associations were affiliated and met 
in their first International Convention, in Buffalo, June 7, 1854 — ten 
years and one day from the founding of the parent society in London. 
During the next six years annual conventions were held and there was a 
gradual growth in the number of Associations. The Convention of 
1 860 was held in New Orleans and was largely attended by Associa- 
tion leaders from all sections of the two countries. Nothing in the pro- 
ceedings foreshadowed the coming war but one year from the day on 
which the New Orleans Convention assembled, the first gun of the civil 
war was fired and the exigencies of that conflict made it impracticable 
to hold a general Convention during the next four years. A Convention 
of the northern Associations, however, was held in New York City, 



November, 1 867, to consider Christian work in the Army. At this 
meeting was formed the United States Christian Commission, an organi- 
zation which ministered to both physical and spiritual needs of the men 
in the Army, sending out during the period of the war more than five 
thousand Christian helpers to the camps and hospitals and distributing 
over five million dollars in money and supplies. The Southern Associa- 




ROBERT R. McBURNEY 

General Secretary New York City Association 1862 to 1898 

tions did much of the same kind of work but not in such organized 
form. 

From the beginning the object of the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciations has been to save and develop young men. This purpose has 
been kept prominent in the work of the Associations. Experience has 



demonstrated that the permanency and success of individual Associa- 
tions depend on their adherence to these primary objectives. It has 
been shown that this work well done is sufficient to absorb all their 
energies. As the work for men has broadened out, it has in every in- 
stance had as its basic principle, the influencing of men for personal sal- 
vation, for character building, and in service for their fellow men in the 
name of Jesus Christ. 

At the first World's Conference of the Young Men's Christian As- 
sociations, which was held in Paris in 1855, there was adopted the his- 
toric Paris Basis, which has since been the bond of unity between the 
various Associjtion bodies throughout the world. This basis is as fol- 
lows: 

"The Young Men's Christian Associations seek to unite those 
young men, who, regarding Jesus Christ as their God and Saviour, 
according to the Holy Scriptures, desire to be His disciples in their 
doctrine and in their life and to associate their efforts for the ex- 
tension of His Kingdom among 3^oung men." 

At the International Convention of the North American Associa- 
tions held in Portland, Maine, in 1 869, there was also adopted what 
has since become known as the Portland Basis, under which the voting 
and office holding privileges in the North American Associations are 
restricted to men who are members in good standing of evangelical 
churches. The North American Associations are thus vitally re- 
lated to the evangelical churches and throughout all the intervening 
years the movement has proved itself to be the church at work, inter- 
denominationally, and through its laymen, for young men and boys. The 
Association is in no sense a substitute for the church nor is it a rival of 
the church. It is rather a united effort of the evangelical churches of 
the community, and young men and boys led into the Christian life 
through its efforts are invariably directed and introduced to the church 
of their choice. 

The Association, like many other successful movements, in its early 
history passed through a time of trial and testing when its real objectives 
sometimes seemed obscured and errors and crudities incidental to a 
necessarily experimental period were in evidence. The meetings 
were mixed both as to character and sexes. Every current "ism" tried 



to "ride in the Association saddle," but little by little, the Association 
worked out its own settled principles and as early as 1888 these were 
enunciated by Robert R. McBurney, then the General Secretary of the 
New York City Association, in the following words: 

"First: The work shall be for young men and boys only. 

Second: That the welfare of the whole man — body, soul and 
spirit — should be promoted by the energetic development of the 
physical, intellectual, social and spiritual departments of our work. 

Third: That points of doctrine controverted by evangelical 
Christians are to be avoided, and the simplicity of the Gospel ad- 
hered to. 

Fourth: That the churches to which our members belong have a 
prior claim on their sympathy and labors. 

Fifth: That when questions of moral reform become political party 
questions, our Association, as such, can have no relation to them 
politically. 

All these principles may be thoroughly understood and zealously 
advocated, but we need to remember that there is such a thing as dead 
orthodoxy, even in Association work and method. Our knowledge 
must be vitalized and sustained by the Holy Spirit, and we must, as 
workers, be living in close communion with our Lord, or our work for 
Him will be without fruit." 

C. K. Ober, one of the Secretaries of the International Com- 
mittee, has tersely expressed the aim and purpose of the Young Men's 
Christian Association in the following terms: 

WHAT IS THE YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION? 

It is a high-grade, low-cost, young men's club, Christian but not 
sectarian. 

It is an athletic organization that does not use men to promote 
athletics, but uses athletics to develop men. 

It is a night school for young men who work by day. 

It is a home for young men away from home. 

It helps young men not only to help themselves, "but to help the 
other fellow. 

It is a place for a young man to find friends and to make himself 
a friend to the man who needs friends. 

It has no creed, but is controlled by representatives of churches. 
This keeps it a Christian organization but prevents it from becoming 
another church. 

Its fellowship, clubrooms, gymnasiums, baths, classes and all other 
practical advantages are open to all young men, of all faiths or of 
no faith. 

It is not an experiment, but is the survivor of many experiments. 
While other young men's organizations, social, athletic, educational, 
ethical and even religious, have failed, this has succeeded and is now 
in successful operation in over eight thousand places in North America 
and throughout the world. 

8 



The Year Book of the Young Men's Christian Associations of 
North America for 1911 reveals the fact that there are in existence 
in the United States and Canada 2,1 18 Associations. Of these 636 
are in cities; 669 are in universities and colleges; 235 are Rail- 
road Associations; 132 are Colored Men's Associations; 351 are town 
or rural Associations; 36 are Army or Navy Associations and 61 
are Indian Associations. 

These Associations have an aggregate membership of 536,037 
men and boys, of whom 221,629 are members of Protestant evangeli- 
cal Churches and are listed as active or voting members. 72,938 of 
these young men serve on Committees in their respective Associations. 
Nearly $70,000,000 is invested in buildings and other permanent equip- 
ment of the North American Associations. 

From the beginning, the Association has been a movement of Chris- 
tian laymen, managed by them in the interests of the men and boys 
of the community. Working under the direction of these laymen is a 
force of employed officers. The Boston and New York Associations 
employed such men to look after the details of their work as early as 
1852. The employed executive of the local Association is called the 
General Secretary; other employed officers are known as Directors or 
Assistant Secretaries. At the present time there are in North 
America 3,25 1 employed officers of Young Men's Christian Associa- 
tions, of whom 274 are State and International Secretaries. There are 
1,061 General Secretaries, *65 Religious Work Secretaries, 556 Phy- 
sical Directors and Assistants, 1 15 Educational Secretaries, 361 Boys' 
Work Secretaries, and the remainder are Assistant or Associate Secre- 
taries charged with various responsibilities in connection with the build- 
ings or departments of service therein. 

The growing problem of Association work is how to secure com- 
petent and adequately trained officers to administer these great responsi- 
bilities. This growing need of men with a thorough technical prepara- 
tion for their work led to the establishing of two Training Schools, one 
in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1885, and the other in Chicago, in 

* Only a few of the larger Associations employ Religious Work 
Secretaries. In most of the Associations the general administration 
of the Religious work is directed by the General Secretary. 

9 



1890. These two agencies are graduating year by year between sev- 
enty-five and one hundred Secretaries, Physical Directors and other 
Association specialists. In addition to these agencies. Summer Schools 
for the training of Association employed officers have been established 
at Lake Geneva, Wisconsin; Silver Bay, Lake George, New York; 
Lake Couchiching, Ontario; Estes Park, Colorado; Black Moun- 
tain, North Carolina, and Arundel-on-the-Bay, Maryland. This last 
named being established for the training of colored Secretaries who 
deal with the problems of the rapidly growing Colored Men's Depart- 
ment of the Young Men's Christian Association. The Summer Train- 
ing Schools give instruction to over a thousand students each season. 




Association Summer Training Schcol, Silver Bay on Lake George, N. Y. 

In addition to these, a number of the stronger Associations have con- 
ducted in their own Association buildings, Training Centers, in which 
young men who show adaptability and promise are given instructions 
together with the younger Assistant Secretaries, in the principles of the 
work and methods of the Young Men's Christian Association service. 



2. %^tnm^ of ^upcrbi-efion anD €rteu^tDii 

THE Young Men's Christian Association movement began with 
the estabhshing of independent local societies having no organic 
connection and with but little knowledge of each others' existence. 
In 1854, shortly after the establishment of the first societies in Mon- 
treal and Boston, and when there was a total of thirty-two Associa- 
tions in the United States and British Provinces, there gathered in the 
first International Convention of these Associations. This meeting, 
which was attended by thirty-seven delegates, affirmed the principle of 
local self-government which has prevailed throughout all the succeeding 
years, each individual Association having absolute control of its own 
local affairs and being self-supporting and self-perpetuating. To each 
of these Associations is accorded direct representation m all Conven- 
tions, both State and International, on conditions estabhshed by these 
bodies. These Conventions are the legislative bodies of the Associa- 
tions as a whole but with no authority over their local work. 

The permanent Committees of these Conventions (International and 
State or Provincial) with their staffs of experienced secretaries act 
as the agents of the Conventions, covering the entire field with a ser- 
vice of extension and supervision which is exceptionally helpful with- 
out embodying the objectionable features pertaining to a strongly cen- 
tralized governing body. The relation of these Committees to the 
local Associations being purely advisory, they are without authority to 
dictate to the local Association, and the Association, on the other hand, 
is at liberty to call for advice and co-operation from either the Inter- 
national or from the State (or Provincial) Committees as it may desire. 
The International Committee in its present form was created by 
the Convention of 1 866. It now consists of ninety members, 
elected by delegates sent from the local Associations to the 

11 



FREOERJCK 6 




LucitH cwAmm 

PRESi&E/IT aOAROo? 

TRusreES 



VICE-CMAIf?AAA/N 



RICMARD C.MORSE 

Gt/lERAL. StCRf-TARV 



JOrtAlR.MOTT 

ASSOCIATE. OEAItRAU 
S£C1?ETA(?Y 



1 



OFFICERS OP TME inTCR/IATIOrfAL Cor\AMTTEE 
OF YOU/HQ /-\E/1'5 CMRt&TIArt A350CIATIO/SS «:«S^ 



12 



Triennial Conventions. Its headquarters are at 1 24 East Twenty- 
eighth Street, New York City, with branch offices in Chicago, Mon- 
treal and other important centers. The Committee employs a force of 
one hundred and eleven executive, traveling and office secretaries on the 
North American field, besides a staff of one hundred and twenty-eight 
secretaries engaged in planting the American type of Association work 
in the important centers of the non-Christian world. 

For efficiency in administration the Home work of the Inter- 
national Committee in its Student, Railroad, Industrial, Army and 
Navy, County or Rural, Religious, Educational, Physical, Boys', Col- 
ored and Field Departments is directed by sub-Committees which 
report to the regular monthly meeting of the whole Committee. 
The present Chairman of the International Committee is Alfred 
E. Marling of New York City, and at the head of the Commit- 
tee's secretarial staff is Richard C. Morse, who has been the effi- 
cient General Secretary since 1 869, and John R. Mott, who, as 
Associate General Secretary, has general charge of the student work 
and the work in foreign lands. 

Supplemental to and patterned after the International, are the 
State and Provincial Committees, which have been organized by the 
International Committee. These Committees while entirely independ- 
ent of the International Committee work in co-operation with it and 
exercise a closer and more immediate relation to the local Associations 
in their respective fields. At the present time there are 44 states and 9 
provinces of Canada thus organized, and their Committees employ a 
total of 1 20 executive and traveling secretaries. From the beginning 
of their history these Committees have been a most important factor 
in the extension and efficiency of the Association movement. 



16 



3* €l)e €itp association 

THE work of the Young Men's Christian Association began in 
a city. Probably its largest work will always be done in the great 
centers of population, but its adaptability has rendered it efficient 
as a medium of service in rural sections, in the army and navy, among 
railroad men and in industrial communities. 636 cities of the United 
States and Canada have well organized Associations, practically all of 
them occupying and owning splendid and costly buildings erected for 
their special use. The Associations in the larger cities, like New York, 
Chicago, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Pittsburg, Cleveland and Baltimore, 
have from five to twenty-five departments or branches with separate 
buildings for each located in different sections in the city. A partial 
view of the varied work of the average City Association of to-day may 
be obtained by a consideration of the facilities provided in a modern 
city Association building. Included in these are the following: 

Dormitories for young men; gymnasiums with running track, locker 
rooms, swimming pool, baths, dressing rooms; hand ball courts; bowling 
alleys, and physical director's office and examining room; educational 
classrooms; reading room; reference library; Bible classroom.s, special 
Biblical library with relief maps, models, etc.; auditorium; lecture 
room; parlors; social rooms; Secretaries' offices; Committee rooms; 
rooms for Intermediate or High School Department, and Boys' Depart- 
ment rooms with separate gymnasium, class and play rooms, library 
and hall. 

The objective of the modern city Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation, with its specially constructed building, was most admirably 
stated by ex-Governor Northen of Georgia at the recent dedication 
of the building at Macon, when he spoke as follows: 

15 



"WE DEDICATE THIS HOUSE: Eor the saving of the TIME 
of young men: That, instead of spending it in loitering, or in the 
ways that lead to worse than the mere loss of it, they may find here 
such a place for the improvement of spare moments or hours that it 
shall become a habit to allow no part of time to be useless. For 
the saving of the MONEY of the young men: That, instead of 
its being used for strong drink or other harmful things, or even for 




Association Building, Los Angeles, Cal. 

the luxuries of life, they may, by their relation to this institution, be 
led to be true stewards of God, and not 'spend money for that which 
is not bread.' For the saving of the BODIES of young men: That 
the means used may bring all to accept the offered aid of Him who 
alone is enabled to empower them to bring into subjection the body 
and keep it as 'the temple of the Holy Ghost.' For the saving of the 
MINDS of young men: That here they may be free from the dangers 
of evil communications and of bad literature, and in the educational 
classes they may find such development of the intellect as will be 
of genuine benefit, because the 'fear of the Lord is the beginning 
of wisdom.' For the saving of the SOULS of young men: That 
they may be made to realize that the only proper use of TIME is 
such as prepares for eternity, and the only correct use of MONEY is 
that which ministers to the establishment of Christ's Kingdom, that 
in the BODY 'the wages of sin is death,' that the MIND not subject 
to the will of God is subject to Satan, and that if they gain the whole 
world and lose the SOUL, life is worse than a failure." 

The modern City Association is an incorporated body whose affairs 



16 



are administered by a Board of Directors, each one of whom must be 
a member in good standing in some evangehcal Church. To this 
Board is entrusted the supervision of the entire work and its guiding 
and molding power is felt in every department. Committees from the 
Board and from the membership are appointed for the administration 
of the detailed work of the several departments of the Association. In 
the case of the larger cities, where the Association has several depart- 
ments or branches with separate buildings, the Board of Directors has 
general relation to the entire work throughout the city and the admin- 
istration of the work of the different departments in their respective 
buildings is delegated to Committees of Management appointed by and 
responsible to the Board of Directors. 

The chief executive officer of the Association's employed force is 
the General Secretary. Associated with him in the more important 
Associations will be found a Rehgious Work Secretary, an Educational 
Secretary, a Physical Director, a Boys' Work Secretary, a Secretary 
of the employment bureau and such force of general and departmental 
assistants as the extent of the work may demand. 

One of the most important features of the work of the Young 
Men's Christian Association is that it unites in its service and on its 
platform Christian men of all evangelical denominations. This catholi- 
city of spirit which it fosters has recently been expressed in "The 
Biblical World," issued by the University of Chicago Press, as follows: 

"The Young ]\Ien's Christian Association has become one of the 
most powerful and effective organizations in the world for the 
expression and cultivation of the spirit of Christianity. Its rise to 
strength, relatively slow in the first half of its existence, has, in the 
last quarter-century been, especially in America, almost startlingly 
rapid. Prejudice has been overcome, the confidence alike of religious 
leaders and of men of wealth has been gained, splendid buildings 
have been erected, able men have been added to its staff, the field of 
its operations and the scope of its activities have been widened, until 
to-day it is known in every land, and is everywhere among the most 
notable and representative institutions of Christianity. It numbers 
among its officers, advocates and supporters, men of the highest 
eminence in political and financial life, and the sums willingly given 
to it every year for its work at home and abroad are reckoned not 
in thousands or hundreds of thousands, but in millions of dollars. 

"The Association had its birth not only within Christianity but 
within the environment of distinctively orthodox and evangelical 
Christianity. It came into existence, moreover, in a time when the 

17 



lines of discrimination, not only between Christianity and other 
religions, but between evangelical Christian Churches and all other 
Christian bodies were sharply drawn. It is still somewhat surprising 
that a Hebrew or a Confucianist should give money for the promotion 
of a Christian Association. But it would have been far more so when 
the Association came into being, and in those days the friendliness of 
Christian sects one to another, which commonly prevails to-day, would 
have seemed to many actual infidelity to sacred truth. 



Boston 

Young 

Men's 

Christian 

associatio? 








iilliliISi *"[i 's i i i § i 5 1 i i Ummtm-m^nK 

kmkMiM F^, mm 



"The Association has been a principal factor in creating the present 
trend toward harmony and co-operation of all the forces of Christen- 
dom. In all the world, it is to-day the most outstanding practical 
expression of the unity of Christendom and of the supremacy of 
character over formulated creed." 

The following testimony of Associate Justice Charles E. Hughes, 
of the United States Supreme Court, as to the usefulness of the Asso- 
ciation is equally significant: 

"The Young Men's Christian Association constitutes, in my judg- 
ment, one of the most important factors for the maintenance of proper 
standards of life and exerts a powerful influence upon the young men 
of the country. It is wholesome; its management, as I have observed 
it, has been broad-minded and in the best sense patriotic." 



18 



4. Witt^ iSailroaD J^len 

THE 90,000 men employed in general administration, the 600,- 
000 men employed in maintenance of ways and structures, the 
400,000 men employed in maintenance of equipment, the 800,- 
000 men employed in conducting transportation — a total of nearly 
2,000,000, together constitute the field of the Railroad Young Men's 
Christian Association in North America. The objective of this depart- 
ment of the Association movement is to reach this army of men with its 
practical message of Christian brotherhood and helpful service, minis- 
tering to the needs of both body and soul. 

For the social, physical, intellectual and religious welfare of these 
men 235 Railroad Associations have been estabhshed and are main- 
tained at division and terminal points in the United States and Canada. 
Within the buildings of these Railroad Associations are found all the 
privileges of a well-conducted club, or, better yet, of a Christian home. 
The man coming in from a long run finds rest rooms, clean and inex- 
pensive; restaurants operated without thought of profit; social rooms 
attractively equipped; modern sanitary baths and lavatories, while libra- 
ries and reading-rooms await his leisure. Moreover he finds that all 
these privileges and the brotherly service of the secretaries in charge are 
vitalized and made attractive by the Spirit of Him whose name the 
Association bears. 

The Associations are operated in a true spirit of partnership. Offi- 
cial and employee meet on a common level, uniting in bearing the cost 
of building construction and of Association maintenance. Approxi- 
mately $4,200,000 is now invested in Railroad Association buildings, 
and of this amount the Railroad Companies have contributed a total 
of $3,000,000. Toward the annual operating expenses, aggregating 
$1,400,000, the Railroad Companies contribute a total of $600,000. 

19 



These Associations offer, however, much more than material com- 
forts and conveniences. They offer to the raihoad employee oppor- 
tunities for spiritual development and for mental growth. The field 
of the Railroad Department of the Young Men's Christian Association 
is twofold: First, all the railroad men in North America; second, all 
the railroad MAN — his body, mind and spirit. A beginning only 
has been made in occupying this field. The present membership rep- 
resents less than one-twentieth of the great army for whose welfare the 
Railroad Association exists, and, while it is true that many not in the 




Union Station Railroad Branch, St. Louis, Mo. 

membership are benefitted directly and indirectly, it is equally true that 
the great majority of railroad men are yet untouched. 

Railroad Association work had its beginning in Cleveland, Ohio, in 
1871, when a railroad men's prayer meeting was organized and con- 
ducted by railway employees, aided by members of the City Young 
Men's Christian Association. This was followed within a few months 
by Sunday services held in the waiting-room of the passenger station, 
and early in 1872, with the co-operation of the railroad officials and 
the City Association, a room in the depot was set apart and furnished 
as a resort for the railroad employees and as a place for holding their 

20 



religious meetings. At the close of the first year's work in Cleveland, 
the following lines of effort were reported: Religious meetings. Tem- 
perance Work, Visits to Sick and Injured, Employment Bureau, Li- 
brary, Distribution of Papers and Monthly Socials. 

From year to year the work of the Association for railroad men 
has grown in the confidence of railroad investors, officials and em- 
ployees, and the Association, which at its inception did not consciously 
look beyond a small group of men m a smgle city, has, with the co- 
operation of both employer and employee, developed until in the words 
of President James McCrea of the Pennsylvania Railroad: "It is now 
rightly recognized as an important factor in general railroad work." An 
equally significant testimony comes from President L. E. Johnson of the 
Norfolk & Western Railway, who says: "We heartily believe in the 
Young Men's Christian Association. We count it as one of our neces- 
sary items of expense in modern railroad equipment." 

The field and vision of the Railroad Association is rapidly widen- 
ing, so that to-day, in addition to its regularly organized work at the 
division and terminal points, it maintains special work among the rail- 
road pioneers in far western construction camps, has adapted its work 
to meet the needs of street railway employees, has established a unique 
Association for colored railroad men in the South and has planted ef- 
fective and growing outposts among the railroad employees of the Far 
East in India, Korea and Japan. 

The Railroad Department is pre-eminently Christian in purpose and 
method. Two thousand and fifty members served on religious work 
committees during the year 1911. The total attendance at 3,703 shop 
meetings conducted under Association auspices exceeded 250,000 rail- 
road men. Bible classes showed a total enrollment of 8,030 students. 
There were 2,447 professed conversions and of this number 1,257 are 
already known to have definitely united with the church. 

To meet the intellectual needs of members, 183 Association libraries 
circulated 241,647 technical and general books last year, while during 
the same time 132 provided 2,172 practical talks upon topics of 
common interest. Social desires were met by more than 1 ,990 socials 
and receptions and nearly 500 more formal entertainments, while privi- 

21 



leges already named as well as physical training and outdoor recrea- 
tion provided for normal physical needs. 

Marked as has been the success of the Railroad Department thus 
far, those who are most famiHar with its possibilities believe that it is 
only entering upon the largest usefulness of its career. There is a 
constant tendency on the part of Associations already existing toward 
increased efficiency and with it there is a steady growth in the number 




Canadian Pacific Railroad Association Building, Kenora, Ontario 

of fields occupied and the number of men to whom the Association 
ministers. 

The equally appreciative attitude of both railroad official and 
railroad employee is well shown in the following testimonies: 

W. C. Brown, President, New York Central Lines : "I say without 
hesitation that in my opinion no investment of a like amount by the New 
York Central Lines has ever paid or ever can pay so- large a return as 
this expenditure of $700, ()()() in establishing, and approximately $40,000 each 



year for the maintenance and support of these railroad departments of the 
Young Men's Christian Association." 

W. S. Stone. Grand Chief. Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers: 
"I hope I shall live long enough to see a branch of the Railroad "i'oung 
Men's Christian Association established at every division terminal on 
every railroad on the North American continent." 




WHBIHWI 




msnis[ 



"l lBIII HH HBK 

MS 




Norfolk & Western Railroad Associatiox Buildino. 
Williamson, W. Va. 



23 



5. Woth Witl) ^tutient^ 

THE moral integrity of the student class is a matter of national 
concern to any people. Time after time the most vital issues 
of the national life have depended upon or have been the product 
of the thinking of the men from the universities and colleges. The 
battles of England, it has been said, were won on the football fields of 
Eton and Rugby, and the political future of the Empire predicted in 
the debating societies of Oxford and Cambridge. The past twelve 
months, which have witnessed the foundmg of the new Republic of 
China, bear abundant testimony to the importance of the student class 
in the re-shaping of that nation. The men who have guided the af- 
fairs of that wonderful people through perhaps the most remarkable 
revolution in all history are largely those who have been trained in the 
mission colleges and foreign universities. 

The commission laid upon America as "the melting pot of the na- 
tions" brings with it the necessity for training up a class of men who, 
as the leaders of the thought-life of the nation, may unerringly guide 
to the honorable and just solution of the intricate problems which we 
are facing. The mingling of two races inevitably brings to the sur- 
face either the vices or virtues of both. The peoples of Europe who 
are pouring into Canada and the United States by the hundreds of 
thousands each year have many sterling qualities to contribute to the 
composite life; they likewise have many vices with which to undermine 
the national integrity of their new home. The determining factor will 
be the attitude of their fellows in this new world. Exploit them, slaugh- 
ter them, treat them shabbily, and the product will be a bitterness and 
hatred and a spirit of retahation such as an Anglo-Saxon does not 
know. Treat them like brothers, enact and enforce wise laws for 
their safeguarding, show them the path to real freedom, and the product 

25 




'^'-*s^*^ 




will be a national life of untold virility and power. But the men who 
are to determine the attitude of the nation — the future executives, legis- 
lators, employers of labor, the lawyers, the judges, and the captains 
of industry, are largely in the colleges to-day. Add to these the three 
great professions which touch the home life so intimately — the physi- 
cian, the teacher, and the minister, and it is a self-evident fact that as 
go the colleges, so will go the nation in its treatment of the strangers 
from over the water who seek a refuge on our shores. 



Student Association Building, 
Georgia School of Technology, 
Atlanta, Ga. 



Students are not only a determining class, but a tempted class of men 
as well. John R. Mott, who knows students the world over, says, 
"I might truthfully say that students are the most tempted class in the 
world to-day. I will say that certainly no other class of men are more 
fiercely tempted." The large majority are in the transition stage be- 
tween boy and man; they are therefore subject to temptations of the 
body in common with other men; such temptations gain additional 
force in student life through the nervous strain of classroom and lecture, 
and from the sedentary habits of the majority. 

To the struggle from within may be added the insidious approach 
of evil in its gilded and attractive forms from without, thus making the 
temptations to lower the moral standards doubly powerful in student 
centres. 

Most student communities are isolated communities. They are 
entities in themselves. The problems of the slums are academic ques- 
tions in many colleges. Sorrow and suffering are largely absent. The 
great ground-swells of public opinion do nol always find their way into 
these inland bays. Thus it is that the college man is tempted to become 
provincial in an age when the world consciousness is awakening, and 
men are no longer thinking in terms of nations alone. 



26 



Again, the pressure of the material is becoming more and more 
evident in educational circles. The student of to-day can elect courses 
in which he deals with things almost exclusively, and there is a real 
danger that he may adopt a materialistic philosophy of life, a philosophy 
in which the tangible is all, and the spiritual is relegated to the back- 
ground. True, the influence of the instructor is the vital thing in 
helping a student translate his new learning into a wholesome personal 
philosophy, but year by year the official contact of professor with 
student is becoming less and less. At no other time in his life is he 
in greater need of wise counsel and advice. His personal creed or 
philosophy, which is now in the making, will determine his attitude 
toward God and man, and his attitude will be the criterion of hun- 
dreds, if not thousands, of his fellows. 

The cardinal student temptation is selfishness. As always it is a 
peculiarly insidious temptation, but nowhere more so than in student 
life. For four years or more the student lives to himself; he shapes his 
course for his personal benefit; he comes and goes as he likes; laws are 
relaxed, and standards inverted; the treasures of art and science and 
literature are laid before him for the asking, and magnificent buildings 
become his common habitation. He is tempted to regard himself as a 
member of a privileged class. If the future leaders of the nation do 
not go out to become the champions of the down-trodden, the chal- 
lengers of entrenched wrong, but settle down to lives of selfish ease, 
because of habits formed in student days, then "the melting pot" will 
never exercise the function in the life of the world for which it was 
prepared. 

Four great influences for righteousness are at work in the institu- 
tions of higher learning. The first is the influence of the home. Each 
incoming freshman class has a nucleus of fine young men who have 
had the foundations of character laid in Christian homes. A desire 
to follow the truth wherever it may lead, a determination to do right, 
cost what it may, and an unalterable faith in a Fatherly God, are the 
sheet anchors in the lives of thousands upon thousands of students to- 
day. In these men lies the hope of the future. 

The second factor is the influence of the professor. True it is 

27 



that large classes make wide gulfs between student and teacher, but in 
every college there are some men who are bridging that gulf. Both by 
what they say or do not say in and out of the classroom, and by the 
way in which they say or do not say if they are emphasizing the 
supremacy of the spiritual over the material; they are seeking out the 
tempted and doubting students, and with wise counsel and mature judg- 
ment aiding them in the fight for character. Hundreds of men whose 
lives are being devoted to the service of mankind out in the world look 
back to such men as their spiritual fathers. 

The third force is that of the church. The past decade has seen 
an awakening of the church to a new sense of responsibility for stud- 
ents, especially in the great non-denominational institutions. Church 
edifices convenient for students have been erected; ministers who under- 
stand student life and problems have been secured; Bible schools have 
been rearranged, and special student pastors employed to specialize in 
reaching students for the Christian life. Nothing can ever take the 
place of the sacraments of the Church in relating men to spiritual truth, 
nor can the permanent religious instruction of students rest elsewhere 
than in the church. The pastorates of these university and college 
churches are second to none in their power to vitally mold the life of the 
nation. 

The fourth factor couples up and co-ordinates the essential elements 
of all the others. It is the organization expressive of the voluntary 
religious life of students — the Student Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation. Years of experience have shown that those influences which 
are indigenous to student life are most vital in their results. The col- 
lege Associations are essentially student organizations — the organic ex- 
pression of the religious instinct in college life ; they are composed of 
students and professors banded together for work by and for students, 
supervised by men in close and intimate contact with the life of students, 
and expressed in methods especially adapted to meet student needs. To 
this organization the leading educators are looking with hope; to it 
some college presidents are turning for unfailing help in the solution of 
the social and moral problems of college life; to it some of the chosen 
students are giving their lives as supervisory officers — a sure proof of its 

28 



efficiency in touching student life. Upon this organization, therefore, of 
the students themselves rests the hope of the nation that its future leaders 
may be men whose lives are consecrated to the service of humanity. 

In 669 of the universities, colleges, theological seminaries and pre- 
paratory schools. Student Associations are organized enrolling a total 
membership of 62,626. 

Because of the fact that provision is otherwise made for the physical, 
social and intellectual life of the students, practically all of the emphasis 
of the Association in the student field is upon the religious work. 

The reports on Bible work from the Student Associations last year 
indicate that 26,420 men were enrolled in voluntary classes for the 
study of the Scriptures and that in addition to classes conducted in the 
Association rooms, many classes were held in fraternity houses and in 
dormitories. Special Bible study courses adapted to the varying needs 
of the students in the different grades of institutions are furnished and 
a large number of faculty men are to be found in the leadership of the 
normal classes. The Bible study courses are arranged for daily study, 
as it has always been the policy of the Student Association leaders to 
urge the observance by individuals of a daily period of study and prayer 
in addition to the weekly gathering in the Bible study classes. 

From the beginning the Student Association movement has stood 
strongly for the presentation, both privately and publicly, without apol- 
ogy, of the direct personal claims of Jesus Christ upon the lives of 
students. Meetings of an evangelistic character are held from week to 
week throughout the college year, and in many of the institutions a 
series of special meetings for Christian decisions are held from time to 
time. The demand at present for evangelists, spiritually and intel- 
lectually qualified, to deal with students is far greater than the number 
available. 

Beginning with the year 1 886, when, at the invitation of Mr. 
Dwight L. Moody, the Christian college students of America met in 
their first summer conference at Northfield, the student conferences have 
been an important factor in the efficiency of Association work in the 
student field. Nine such conferences are now held annually, two in the 
South, two in the East, two in the middle West, two on the Pacific 

29 



Coast and one for colored students. At these conferences addresses 
are delivered by men skilled in dealing with the intellectual, moral and 
social problems of students in their religious aspect, Bible and mission 
study classes are conducted, group conferences on special topics of 
interest to leaders of Student Associations are held, and addresses are 
given and institutes conducted upon the absorbing question of the choice 
of a vocation. These conferences are the rallying point of the whole 
student work and are attended each year by about 2,500 men. 

The Student Associations have always proceeded upon the assump- 
tion that unselfish service for others should characterize the Christian 
college student, and so special effort is made not only to relate the col- 
lege man to the all-round activities of the Student Association, but also 
to interest him in other forms of Christian service. During the past year 
nearly 4,000 white students in the colleges of the South have been 
enrolled in classes studying the book "Negro Life in the South," pre- 
pared by one of the Southern Student Association leaders. Deputa- 
tions of students at week-ends or during the vacation season are sent into 
rural communities for evangelistic work, Sunday-schools are maintained, 
in some cases almost entirely by students. Other men, under the direc- 
tion of civic societies, charitable organizations and like agencies, are 
engaged in different forms of social service work. Rescue missions 
claim the service of many undergraduates, and in later years a large 
amount of work is being done by members of Student Associations in 
the interest of foreign workingmen. Classes for these men are con- 
ducted in English, civics, elementary science and American citizenship. 
In New York City alone last year 1 65 groups of foreigners have thus 
been cared for by students in the different universities and colleges. 

It was discovered a short time ago that a large majority of the 
students who were interested in religious work and social service during 
their college days, fail to ally themselves with religious and welfare 
enterprises in the communities to which they went after graduation. This 
has led to the establishing of what is known as the "Alumni Work" of 
the Student Association movement, through which graduates are being 
related to religious and welfare work in the churches. Associations and 
other organizations in the communities to which they have gone. 

30 



It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of the Student 
Christian Association as an agency which is inspiring and promoting 
reform movements in college life. To create an atmosphere in which 
honesty is the natural practice in examinations and purity of speech and 
conduct the characteristic of the majority of the students is surely a 
noble achievement. In many institutions the "honor system" has been 
established by the efforts of members of the Christian Association, and 
in not a few instances the leaders in banishing alcoholic drinks from 
all college functions have been prominent Christian Association men. If 
the evil practices of college life are to be permanently suppressed, student 
sentiment must be aroused, and surely no organization can so profoundly 
influence the opinions and attitude of students as the Christian Asso- 
ciation. Able leaders in the fight against the social evil are certain to 
result from the active propaganda of sex education now carried on by 
many Associations through the wise use of literature, lectures and 
conferences. 

From the colleges must come the recruits for the Christian ministry 
and if strong men are to dedicate their lives to this great profession, 
some agency must bring to their attention its claims and opportunities. 
The responsibility for securing able candidates for the ministry rests 
heavily upon the Student Associations, and through special institutes and 
conferences conducted by the Associations, influential students are 
brought into contact with the personality and message of the most 
attractive pastors and theological professors ; also by the careful distribu- 
tion of specially prepared books and pamphlets, an earnest effort is being 
made to influence many of the most promising students to prepare for 
the Christian ministry. 

As a result of investigation, it has been discovered that a much 
larger number of college trained men attain positions of prominence in 
the secretaryship of the Young Men's Christian Association than from 
any other class of candidates. This fact has naturally led all depart- 
ments of Association activity to desire the services of college graduates. 
Not only are special efforts being made through Student Associations to 
relate graduates to the training schools for the secretaryship, but also to 
enlist them on the "Fellowship Plan" in service under the direction of 

31 



experienced secretaries in the best Associations. At every conference 
of students and by means of institutes as well as personal effort the 
needs of this profession are brought to the attention of college men. 

The dearth of able candidates for the mission field was a potent 
factor leading to the organization of the Student Volunteer Movement 
for foreign missions, which during twenty-five years has secured decis- 
ions from thousands of college students to become foreign missionaries. 
Not less than 5,000 of these volunteers have been successful in reaching 
their posts abroad under the different church boards. The remarkable 
awakening of students to the claims of the whole world can be attributed 
in large measure to the extensive propaganda in favor of the study of 
specially prepared books on world evangelization and also to the ag- 
gressive work of prospective missionaries among their fellow students. 
Recognition should be given to the scores of institutes, conferences and 
hundreds of interviews, as well as the Quadrennial Convention of the 
Student Volunteer Movement which once in a college generation brings 
most powerfully the challenge from all the nations of the world. 

The past ten years have witnessed a marvelous increase in the 
demand for college graduates as directors of all forms of professional, 
charitable and philanthropic work. Student Associations are not un- 
mindful of this claim and consequently, in response to requests from 
national and local charity organizations, they are sounding the call to 
this comparatively new profession. By means of special studies and 
addresses by experts in social work, as well as by attendance at Con- 
ventions and the activity of social service secretaries, the Christian Asso- 
ciation movement is endeavoring to enlist many of the ablest Christian 
college men in some form of charity work as a life profession. 

In order to extend the influence of Christianity beyond the visits of 
secretaries and personal contact through conferences, a special officer 
is maintained who devotes his full time to the production and forma- 
tion of literature for the Student Associations. New books and pamph- 
lets are published every year and special effort is put forth in their 
promotion. Last year nearly 38,000 Bible study books alone were 
sold to students. 

In co-operation with the Student Volunteer Movement, "The Inter- 

33 



collegian," a journal published monthly through the college year, is 
issued. It is designed to aid in the dissemination of news of Student 
Associations and of the most recent experiments in student work, to- 
gether with articles on other themes as may be considered helpful in 
Student Association activity. 

A remarkable opportunity is afforded North American students in 
the increasing number of foreign students who are entering the universi- 
ties of the United States and Canada. By mingling with the hundreds 
of students from Latin-America and the different nations of the Orient 
the prejudice of many American students is being broken down, ac- 
quaintance and understanding promoted, and the foreign students made 
to feel at home in our midst. One is solemnized by the thought that 
the attitude of the majority of these students from abroad toward great 
moral issues and Christianity itself will be largely determined by what 
they see and hear among American students. Happily provision is 
made through the Student Association Movement for meeting foreign 
students when they reach our shores and facilitating their enrollment in 
the college of their choice. They are also invited to the Summer Con- 
ferences, and the Chinese students are aided in maintaining their own 
Christian Association supervised by a Chinese secretary. 

Patriotism, if not ardent zeal for the extension of the Kingdom of 
God, must lead every loyal American citizen to desire that college 
trained men, whether they enter business or professional life, at home or 
abroad, shall always uphold the great Christian principles of our civili- 
zation. At home they can fortify and promote the noble enterprises 
of Christian society; abroad, in commerce, diplomacy, military or any 
other capacity, college graduates can do more than any other body of 
men to extend the correct interpretation of our American civilization and 
the Christian principles upon which it rests. 

In the light of these and other considerations, therefore, it is evident 
that the activities of the Student Young Men's Christian Association 
are supremely important, because they seek to unite students in a war- 
fare against evil and in the enthronement of righteousness in all phases 
of college life. 



33 



6. Witt^ SnDu^trial Wothtt^ 

THE most striking spectacle in North America is its industrial 
progress. The United States, heretofore an agricultural country, 
last year produced two dollars in manufactured product for one 
dollar from the farms. The industrial development of North America 
during the next decade will undoubtedly be still more striking. 

It is not the output, however, but the workers that concern the Asso- 
ciation. These men are massing in the cities, crowding around the great 
urban factories and mills. Fifteen states already have more than half 
of their population in the cities and these states while embracing only 
one-fourth of the territory of the United States hold two-thirds of all of 
its industrial workers. 

Two-thirds of the workers of the country are right at the doors of 
the City Young Men's Christian Associations. These industrial work- 
ers out-number the clerical and professional group almost three to one. 

As never before the attention of the city Associations is being di- 
rected to these men and a connection between the two is being set up. 
The best Association buildings, the best Association leadership and the 
most available Association money are in the cities and where the Asso- 
ciation really addresses itself to these workers there is found in the 
membership not fewer of the clerical group but many more of the in- 
dustrial workers. 

In recent years there has been a marked awakening of the Associa- 
tions of the country to the opportunities among industrial workers. 
New lines of approach are being developed. Among these are: Ex- 
tension Work, the Industrial Service Movement and Immigration Work. 

Where the men cannot or will not come to the Association, the Asso- 
ciation goes to them, in shops, club houses, lodge rooms, community 
centres — anywhere, and at any time — at the noon hour in hundreds of 

35 



factories, at midnight among the night-workers, four o'clock in the morn- 
ing among street car men — whenever and wherever the workers can be 
brought together. 

The Gospel is given in terms of the physical, religious or intellectual, 
or combining all of these. A million and a quarter attended the religi- 
ous meetings last year in shops and factories and this is only one of 
the lines of contact. This extension work takes on different forms. 
In some places the boys in the industries are organized into self-improve- 
ment clubs. Some times the bosses in the shops are enlisted in the 
effort to help boys under them, the Association's slogan in this being "the 




Association Building, Gary, Ind. 



responsibility of the bosses for the boys." Employment work is being 
enlarged and vocational guidance is helping to locate boys where they 
will avoid the "blind alley" occupations. Health talks and play grounds 
and many other forms of community service come under this head of 
extension work. 

A Roman Catholic master mechanic in one of the great shops in 
the country, said recently: "This extension work you are doing in 
these shops has completely changed the atmosphere. It is a great 
benefit." 

Another point of contact is the Industrial Service Movement by 
which engineering students are enlisted to go from their colleges every 
week to do some volunteer work that brings them into contact with work- 
ing men. These students not only render real service but they get an 

36 



understanding of the industrial worker and his problems that only per- 
sonal intercourse can give. This work began in Yale in 1907-08 
and now fifty colleges are in the movement with a thousand students at 
work touching ten times as many working men in sympathetic service. 
Then, too, these students have begun to show the effect of this contact 
upon their lives as engineers. Some of them, now graduates, are in 
charge of numbers of men. That their contact while students has made 
them more efficient in handling men is shown by the interest they now 
take in the living, working and leisure conditions of their employes. 
One such student graduating from a forestry school, now in charge of 
a large lumber camp, inaugurated a system of teaching English to for- 
eigners in the camps. More than that, when he discovered the condi- 
tions under which the men lived, he tore out the vermin producing bunks 
and replaced them with iron cots, an evidence of interest which would 
probably not have been given but for his personal intercourse with a lot 
of foreigners to whom he taught English while a student in the engineer- 
mg school. 

Another line of service is the work for "Coming Americans." This 
emigration and immigration work was begun in 1907. To-day there 
are four hundred associations doing some form of service for the immi- 
grants. Last year 15,000 were in classes in EngHsh, 50,000 attended 




English for Foreigners, Somerville, Mass. 
37 



lectures and practical talks on citizenship, etc. Ten secretaries at the 
ports of embarkation in Europe render personal service to the departing 
emigrants. Practically every port on the Atlantic Coast has its port 
secretary meeting immigrants on arrival. On the ships in the steerage 
it has been demonstrated that much service can be rendered, including 
advice, instruction in English and wholesome entertainment, all of which 
helps to remove suspicion and makes contact with the Association easier 
after arrival in North America. At some railway stations secretaries 
are acting as guides and protectors. The great service, however, is 
rendered by the Association at the point of destination and the number 
of Associations doing work for the immigrants is increasing rapidly. It 
will thus be seen that a series of contacts is afForded to the immigrant, 

proving to him that the Association is an agency of "Christian friendli- 

»» 
ness. 

But all the industrial workers are not in cities and towns. Hundreds 
of thousands are in small industrial communities, in villages and isolated 
camps. And here some of the romances of Association work are found. 
In the iron and steel towns, such companies as the United States Steel 
Corporation, the American Car and Foundry Company, the Westing- 
house Air Brake Company, and the Baldwin Locomotive Works, are 
cooperating in the establishment and maintenance of efficient Associations 
among the employes of their companies. Millions of dollars have been 
put into buildings by these companies for this work. The cotton mills 
in the Carolinas alone gave last year the interest on half a million dollars 
for the maintenance of Association work. Five years ago an Associa- 
tion was established in one cotton mill village — last year sixty villages 
were touched. The lumber industry shows a like interest, spending 
$25,000 a year for the maintenance of Associations. 

There are seventy-five Associations supported jointly by operators 
and operatives. These are found among the coal miners where the 
Association multiplies life saving and character making forces; in the 
construction camps, where it creates good cheer centres; in the cotton 
mill villages, where it helps to put the character basis under all of the 
so-called welfare work; among the metal miners where it increases con- 
tentment by improving conditions; among the saw mill towns and log- 

38 



ging camps, where it fights drink and vice and reminds men of better 
things, and in the various manufacturing communities, where it deals 
with the health, education and morals of both the individual and com- 
munity. 




WooDSiDE Association Building, Greenville, S. C. 

There are one hundred and thirty-seven secretaries giving all of their 
time to Association work among industrial workers, while more than 
two hundred secretaries are giving part time. 



39 



7* Sural Wotk 

THE County Work, or Rural department of the Young Men's 
Christian Association seeks to unite in a town, village, rural com- 
munity, or in the open country the vital forces of young manhood 
for self-improvement, physically, socially, mentally, and spiritually, and 
to give expression to these resources in community life, for the better- 
ment of others. 

It considers its legitimate field to include all communities that are 
too small to maintain the city type of Young Men's Christian Associa- 
tion work, generally conceded to include towns of four thousand and 
under. Experience has proven that its best work is done, however, in 
communities in which the rural environment dominates the community 
ideals. There are 45,000 such communities in the United States and 
Canada with a combined population of boys and young men of over 
1 2,000,000, thus including over sixty per cent, of the boyhood and 
young manhood in this field. There are 2,000 counties considered 
organizable in the United States and 500 in Canada on the present 
basis of organization and type of work. 

The term "County Work" is applied to this movement because the 
county affords a ready geographical unit for constructive work. Coun- 
ties have distmctive traditions of their own, social elements, and existing 
organizations of a county-wide character. As the result of repeated 
failures in individual communities apart from other communities, a coun- 
ty-wide organization, commanding the combined resources of men and 
money within a county, made possible in community life that which 
could not have been accomplished independently. 

There are two factors that enter into this plan so essential to success 
— volunteer effort and expert supervision. The voluntary organization — 
the County Committee, consisting of from fifteen to twenty prominent 

41 



business and professional men and successful farmers, constitute the ad- 
ministrative unit and clearing house for policies and programs for the 
county-wide activities as well as for individual communities. They 
all must stand for the best things in community life, be vitally related 
to the church, to the school and other agencies that make for community 
progress. The County Committee is responsible for a budget varying 
from $2,000 to $6,000 annually secured by voluntary contributions, 
which enables them to employ a secretary, who is a trained expert, as 
their executive officer. Thus the work is correlated and coordinated and 
a central clearing house is established through which any community 
and every community may find help and counsel in promotmg internal 
welfare. 




County Wokk Class in Apple Growing, Mesa County, Colorado 

The County Secretary "is usually the fittest type of the college man, 
often not only a college graduate, but also with some special training. 
He is a man who loves country life and believes in the country and has 
great faith in the immediate future of the rural districts. The county 
secretaryship is fast being supplemented with agricultural college grad- 
uates. He is usually a man of large capacity for leadership, with a 

42 



broad knowledge of human nature and a fine friendliness as well as an 
earnest Christian purpose and a great longing to help country boys and 
young men to well developed Christian manhood." 

He is in a real sense a community builder. His primary task is to 
discover, enlist, train, and develop leadership. He is also a servant. 
Pastors, Sunday School superintendents and teachers, public school su- 
perintendents and day school teachers, fathers and mothers, granges, 
farmers' clubs and institutes, and many other organizations seek his co- 
operation and advice. In the individual community, having discovered 
leaders and set them to work, he executes the plans and policies adopted 
by the County Committee through volunteer leadership. His relationship 
is with the few men who are the leaders rather than with the masses. 
There are now fifty such secretaries in forty-nine organized counties. 

County Work is not an attempt to build up a new organization in 
county communities. It recognizes as the primary institutions of the 
community the home, the school, and the church. Furnishing a common 
platform upon which the various interests of the people will find expres- 
sion and where these interests can come together in a democratic spirit, 
is the unifying task of the County Work in the organized counties. It 
stands for the elimination of waste, for the interpretation of real needs 
after careful surveys have been made, for the assumption of specific 
tasks by specific individuals and communities. It gives itself to the 
awakening of a social consciousness — a getting together; it seeks to 
supplement and not to supplant. If it can persuade a virile type of 
a man to teach a class of boys in a Sunday School, or a leader to super- 
vise the play and athletics of a school, or a farmer to give his boy a 
man's chance, it has made a contribution to the community life, and its 
leaders are as well satisfied as they would be if a new organization 
were formed. 

Two, three, and four months and sometimes more time is given to a 
careful sociological survey, which is made by an expert before any at- 
tempt is made to organize a county, revealing the real needs for work 
in the county. Upon the results of these surveys a comprehensive policy 
for a period of years is outlined. This involves cooperation with experts 
from agricultural colleges, extension departments of universities — not to 

43 



do things for the people, but Tpiih them. Other agencies also cooperate 
in county-wide activities, such as boys' and men's Summer camps, inter- 
county relay races, play festivals and athletic meets, corn-growing con- 
tests, short term courses in agriculture. Social service at the county and 
state fairs is finding expression in rest tents, day nurseries, first aid hos- 
pitals, and in many of the county fairs the management and conduct of 
the athletics have been taken out of the hands of unscrupulous profes- 
sionals and turned over to the Association leaders, with most gratifying 
results. 




Prize Winners of Corn and Potato Contest, Eaton County, Mich. 

No real progress in community life can be made with any degree of 
permanence without commensurate progress of its material well-being, 
and in the rural communities particularly, the natural resources play an 
important part in demonstrations showing the possibilities of soil produc- 
tion. This is shown by the corn-growing, poultry-raising, and fruit- 
growing contests, in the horticultural classes and demonstrations, in 
potato-raising, in dairying, reforestration, etc. For this work it is neces- 
sary to secure the help of experts at experiment stations and agricultural 
colleges, which always comes more than enthusiastically. One-day 
courses are set up in various communities. The county secretary accom- 
panies the experts from community to community. In some of the reg- 
ularly organized counties as many as fourteen and sixteen rural centres 
are organized. This forms a ready approach to a discussion and a 
solution of the economic problems before the younger generation. 

The boy in the country needs to have his school education supple- 

44 



merited by various other educational activities. A more intimate knowl- 
edge of the natural sciences, practical rather than academic, is imparted 
through simple talks on astronomy, biology, botany, zoology, geology, 
and on mathematical subjects related to the farm and to the home. This 
training in practical mathematics covers cost, accounting, measurements 
of garden plots, of the height of trees, and other necessary practice in 
mathematics. 

Rural recreation is another great factor in achieving a healthy con- 
summation of content and normal living. Community play days and 
community carnivals in which every boy and girl, man and woman takes 
part have been held. In one instance, ninety per cent, of the entire 
community turned out to spend the day together, the girls in their games, 
the boys in baseball and outdoor basketball, the smaller children enjoy- 
ing sand-boxes and children's games. These are known as the great 
community play carnivals. Sanitation, domestic and community, hygiene, 
etc., are taken into consideration; practical talks and illustrated lectures 
are given; the rural school teacher is encouraged and aided in organizing 
plays and games during the recess periods; Sunday Schools are brought 
together in athletic leagues; and many other similar efforts afford the 
rare opportunity to the county secretary in some genuine social engi- 
neering. 

Real progress in country life cannot be made without the great 
spiritual forces, and therefore, the Young Men's Christian Association 
puts first and foremost the spiritual motive in everything. The starting 
of Bible study classes, cooperation with Sunday Schools to bring the 
boy into a realization of a virile religious life, and meetings in isolated 
neighborhoods by young men, are some of the religious activities. 

The rural work of the Association now commands the confidence 
of business men to the extent of a quarter of a million dollars a year 
and enlists 2,000 leaders and committeemen, reaching in its activities 
more than 25,000 young men and boys in 500 communities. 



45 



S. Wit^ tl)e imen of ti^t airmip and l^abp 

THREE days after the President's call for volunteers, on April 25, 
1 898, the International Committee of Young Men's Christian 
Associations met in New York City to consider the possibility of 
undertaking a work for the thousands of young men in the regular and 
volunteer forces who were being ordered to the front. Several clearly 
providential steps preceded this matter and it was at once seen by all 
present that a great opportunity for a mighty service was open to the 
Association. A special committee of the International Committee was 
immediately formed, and throughout the period of the war Association 
work was carried on in large tents in all of the army camps. One hun- 
dred and seventy-six secretaries were employed in the field and the cost 
of the work, including that undertaken by State and local committees, 
amounted to a total of $135,000. The outstanding feature of this 
work was the aggressive evangelistic campaign with Dwight L. Moody 
as chairman. Eight thousand men in the different gospel meetings 
openly took a stand for the Christian life. 

At the close of the war prominent officers and many of the enlisted 
men urged that the Young Men's Christian Association organize work 
for the men of the Army and Navy on a permanent basis. It was felt 
that the Association movement which had won its place in the cities, 
colleges and on the railroads could readily adapt its methods to the 
life of the soldiers and sailors. The thousands of young men in the 
Army and Navy had been for the most part neglected and places of sin 
had occupied the environs of the Army posts and Navy yards. No pro- 
vision had been made for the men, while on shore liberty or on pass, 
where they could profitably spend their leisure hours. To this field the 
Association was asked to turn its attention, and as a result the permanent 
Army and Navy work of the Young Men's Christian Associations was 
organized. 

47 



The history of the Army and Navy Associations during these past 
thirteen years is one of phenomenal growth. The material equipment, 
including sites, buildings and endowments, is valued at over $2,000,000. 
The Association is organized in twenty-six Army posts and has ten Navy 
Branches, touching the lives of men not only in the United States but 
in Alaska, on the Canal Zone and in the Philippine Islands. Eighty- 
eight secretaries are giving their time to the promotion of this work for 
soldiers and sailors. The work has become indispensable, as viewed 
by the officers of the Army and Navy. It has received the heartiest 




Army Branch, Fort Leavenworth, Kans. 

endorsement of all three Presidents of the United States, beginning with 
President McKinley, and has met with cordial co-operation from the 
prominent officials both in the War and Navy Departments. 

The first step toward permanency in work for men of the Navy was 
at Brooklyn, when, on March 1 , 1 899, a building near the Navy 
Yard was rented and opened to the men-of-warsmen. It was not long 
before this building was overcrowded and it was necessary to rent ad- 
ditional quarters. Miss Helen Miller Gould, who had taken such great 
interest in the efforts during the Spanish-American War and who had 
given so generously, saw the opportunity to render a permanent service 

48 



to the enlisted men by providing a suitable building at Brooklyn. In 
May, 1902, this splendidly equipped building, costing, approximately, 
$500,000, was dedicated. There were some grave doubts as to 
whether or not this building might be too large, but it was soon over- 
crowded, and sometimes from 1 ,000 to 1 ,500 men had to be turned 
away in a single night for lack of accommodations. This fact led to 
the gift by Mrs. Russell Sage of the extension, which doubled the 
capacity of the Branch, making the total cost of this property over 
$850,000. 




Naval Branch, Brooklyn, N. Y. 

The immediate success of the first Branch brought urgent demands 
from other naval centres and branches were shortly organized in Nor- 
folk, Virginia, Newport, Rhode Island, and Mare Island, California. 
To-day at all of the important navy yards, including Olongapo, Philip- 
pine Islands, the Association is firmly established, and at six of these 
ports it is operating in its own buildings. In 1908 the small rented 
quarters at Norfolk gave way to a magnificent building, costing $325,- 
000, the gift of John D. Rockefeller. At Newport last Fall a build- 

49 



ing costing a similar amount was dedicated for the soldiers and sailors, 
the gift of Mrs. Thomas J. Emery. 

The same rapid extension of the work for the soldiers is to be seen. 
The officers and men welcomed the Association at all of the Army posts 
and as fast as money could be raised the work was organized in the 
important centres. Secretaries were sent with the third expedition to 
the Philippines, and have ever since continued an aggressive work in the 
Islands. The first public Protestant service ever held in the Philippine 
Islands was conducted by the Association. Growing out of the work 
for the soldiers at Manila in the early days of occupation there is now 
a permanent Association for the young men of that city, possessing an 
equipment valued at $300,000. 

The first Army Association building was erected at Fort Jay, New 
York Harbor, at a cost of $6,000. This was shortly followed by a 
building at Fort Hancock, N. J., and another at Fort Monroe, Va., 
given by Miss Gould, costing $40,000. The success of the work in 
these buildings demonstrated the permanent value of such a movement, 
and other posts, such as Forts Leavenworth, Slocum and William Mc- 
Kinley, Philippine Islands, have been provided with substantial buildings. 

The service of the Association is not confined to the soldiers at 
large posts, but even to those men who are isolated in the interior of 
Alaska the influence and help of the Association is carried. A secre- 
tary for the past seven years has visited these isolated posts either by 
dog team in the winter or by a launch in the open season. The secre- 
tary on his annual trip of 2,000 miles down the Yukon River in the 
Association launch, which is fully equipped with a moving picture 
machine, graphophone and tons of magazines and books has brought 
the gospel of good cheer and friendship to many lonely men in the 
frozen North. 

At the summer encampments and maneuvers the Association has 
played an important part, for thousands of men have been surrounded 
by a restraining influence and many hundreds of both regulars and militia- 
men have been won for Christ. Officers have come to expect the pres- 
ence of the Association in the field. Last Spring, when the troops were 
hurried to the Mexican border, a General telegraphed that his entire 

50 



command was unanimous in asking that a secretary and his equipment 
be sent to the front. Thirteen secretaries were soon engaged in this 
special work at the three large manoeuver camps, providing many com- 
forts and privileges which otherwise would have been denied these men 
in the field. 

The efforts of the Association have been practical. Theodore 
Roosevelt, while President, in speaking before a large number of sol- 
diers, said, "The thing I like about this work is that it mixes common 
sense with religion." The Association is providing the social features 
which the men seek while on liberty and the buildings have become the 
headquarters for the men of the service. The dormitories, restaurants, 
game rooms, gymnasiums and locker rooms have met the need of the 




Army Branch, Temporary Building, Philippine Islands 

men. During the past year over 190,000 have slept in the buildings 
and 14,000 were turned away for lack of accommodations; 3,338,- 
000 sailors visited the Navy buildings during the same period; $658,- 
000 was deposited for saving and safekeeping. Since the Association 
has encouraged the saving of money by establishing a banking system, 
the Branches have handled a total of $4,500,000, a part of which 
earned interest for the men. 

The activities of the Association are not restricted to the build- 
ings, for very definite work is promoted in the barracks. Navy Yards 

51 



and aboard battleships. Gospel meetings, entertainments, practical 
talks and lectures are asked for when the ships come to the Navy 
Yards. For the past year there was an attendance of 223,000 soldiers 
and sailors at the entertainments and socials, 98,000 attended Gospel 
meetings and 37,000 were in attendance at Bible classes. Over 
1 1 ,000 attended church in organized church parties. Very definite 
interest is being manifested in Bible study, for aside from regular classes, 
3,674 men enrolled in the Enhsted Men's Bible and Prayer League; 
840 enlisted men joined the Abstinence League. As a result of the 
religious effort during the year, 1 ,860 professed conversions were re- 
ported. The contribution of the Physical and Educational Depart- 
ments to the up-building of Christian character and efficiency cannot 
be estimated. The gymnasiums have attracted hundreds to the build- 
ings for recreation and exercise, and the educational efforts have quick- 
ened ambition and broadened the vision of many. 

The extension of work aboard the battleships while at sea was the 
outgrowth of the activities promoted aboard the ships while in port. 
Men said, "We not only need the Association while in port, but we 
need its influence while at sea." Permission was granted by President 
Taft to place secretaries aboard the ships, and as the Atlantic fleet sailed 
South three years ago the experiment of a shipboard secretary was tried 
out. In the words of the Admiral then in command, "the experiment 
was an unqualified success." President Taft watched with much in- 
terest the work of the shipboard secretary and publicly stated that he 
hoped the time would shortly come when every ship would be equipped 
with a Young Men's Christian Association. Three shipboard secre- 
taries are now at work, one of whom is with the Asiatic fleet rendering 
a large service to the men in the foreign ports. 

The majority of the young men in the Army and Navy serve but 
one enlistment. There is a constant influx from civil life, and the 
Association at work in the Army and Navy can help provide those whole- 
some influences which the young men coming from their homes in the 
cities and towns leave behind them as they enlist. It is a force steady- 
ing the lives of these young men, changing the lives of many and sending 
thousands back into civil life at the end of their enlistment prepared for 
the responsibility which they are to assume. 

58 



9* Witl^ ColnreD M^n 

FROM the beginning, the colored young men of the country were 
in the minds of those who were projecting the Association move- 
ment among the young men of America. In the report of the 
Executive Committee at the International Convention held in Baltimore, 
Md., in May, 1 879, this significant paragraph appears: 

"From the outset the Committee has felt that it was the duty of 
the Associations to encourage work for the elevation of colored young 
men, and every year during the history of the Committee something 
has been done." 

Hardly had the smoke of civil conflict cleared away when colored 
men themselves actively engaged in organizing Young Men's Christian 
Associations for the benefit of their race. Their first association, of 
which there is an authentic record, was organized in Charleston, S. C, 
April 10, 1866. 

A colored association in New York City, organized in 1867, sent 
a delegate to the International Convention held that year in Montreal, 
Canada. A few other Associations were organized during the decade, 
1866 to 1875, which failed to become permanently established because 
of a lack of trained leaders and of adequate supervision. 

At the Toronto Convention in 1876, a fund was subscribed for the 
employment of a secretary to extend the work among colored men, 
and General George D. Johnston, a confederate veteran, accepted the 
call of the International Committee for this service. There are now six 
colored men, secretaries of the International Committee, devoting them- 
selves to the development of the work of this Department. 

In the early years of this effort among colored men, attention was 
centered largely upon educational institutions, the citidal of strategic im- 
portance in every race. The first colored student Association was organ- 
ized at Howard University, Washington, D. C, in 1869. When the 

53 



Intercollegiate Young Men's Christian Association movement was in- 
augurated at the Louisville Convention in 1877, delegates were in at- 
tendance from three colored schools, Howard, Fisk and Walden Uni- 
versities. 



%5;^. 



ii 











Colored Men's Branch, Washington, D. C. 



There are now 1 02 Colored Student Associations organized in uni- 
versities, colleges, professional and industrial schools throughout the 
country, conducted under both state and denominational auspices. 
These associations constitute a moral, social and religious force and a 
unifying cooperative agency of vital importance to this growing and 
aspiring race. 

The phases of their work are similar to those of the other student 
associations in the United States and Canada. Work for new students, 
Bible and mission study classes, religious meetings, neighborhood work 
and social receptions are conducted under the supervision of standing 
committees. 

The voluntary devotional Bible study work of the Associations, dif- 
ficult to introduce into the life and activities of the schools at first, has 
now become a prominent and valued feature of the work. Rapid 

54 



progress has been made largely through a system of Bible Study In- 
stitutes conducted by Secretaries of the International and State Com- 
mittees, with the assistance of prominent ministers and educators. Seven 
such institutes have been held in different states during the school year 
now closing. A Bible Study Institute was held at Tuskegee four years 
ago, which resulted in an enrollment of 400 young men in Association 
Bible classes. This year there is an enrollment at Tuskegee of 827 
young men in voluntary Bible study groups, or seventy-five per cent, of 
the total male attendance. 

Annual Conferences in the past have been attended by delegates 
from associations in all parts of the country, affording valuable op- 
portunities for the dissemination of Association principles and the dis- 
cussion of methods of work. 

Preparations are now being made for the most important step yet 
taken in this section of the work. A Student Summer Conference will 
be held at Kings Mountain, N. C, May 24 to June 2, 1912, the pur- 
pose of which will be to deepen the spiritual life of student young men, 
to train them in the methods of Christian work, and to lead more of the 
ablest young men of the race to devote their lives to the Christian Min- 
istry, to the Secretaryship of the Young Men's Christian Association^ to 
Social Service and to Foreign Missionary Work. 

Side by side with the early growth of this student work, a few 
city Associations struggled into prominence. In 1 898 special at- 
tention was first given to this phase of the work for colored men and 
this resulted in substantial progress and increased efficiency in the city 
work. 

Forty-five city Associations have been established, employing thirty 
secretaries. Twenty buildings valued at $300,000 are owned by the 
colored Associations. 

The first large gift to this department was made by Mr. George 
Foster Peabody, who gave $20,000 for a building for colored men at 
his old home, Columbus, Ga. He was followed by Mr. John D. 
Rockefeller, who gave $25,000 to the Washington building. But it 
remained for Mr. Julius Rosenwald, President of Sears-Roebuck Co., 
Chicago, to render an unparalleled service to his country and to the 

55 



colored young men by offering $25,000 to every city in the United 
States which would raise an additional $75,000 with which to purchase 
land and erect and furnish a building at a total cost of $100,000. 
Chicago was the first city to meet Mr. Rosenwald's condition, and he 
was joined by Messrs. N. W. Harris and Cyrus H. McCormick in 
$25,000 gifts each. Philadelphia, Atlanta, Los Angeles and Indian- 
apolis have met his condition and will soon erect commodious buildings. 
Mr. Rosenwald also included Washington in his offer. His gift has 
already proved the truthfulness of the statement of Mr. N. W. Harris 
on January 1 , I 9 11 , in connection with the public announcement of this 
princely gift when he said: 

"Mr. Rosenwald's gift will stimulate the race throughout the entire 
country. It will furnish many centres from which will radiate not 
only fresh hope, but powerful educative and uplifting forces, I do 
not hesitate to say that Mr. Rosenwald's gift will prove to be the 
most important benefaction the colored race has received since the 
Emancipation Proclamation." 

It has not only interested the large centres of population, but smaller 
cities as well have, in the last year, conducted successful campaigns 
for buildings suitable to their needs. It is a little less than remark- 
able that during the year 1911, over $750,000 were pledged for 
Association buildings for colored men and boys, and one-third of this 
amount was pledged by colored people themselves, amounting to over a 
quarter of a million dollars from a race a little over forty years from 
bondage. They have not only pledged their money, but they are also 
paying it in in sums from a few cents to one thousand dollars each. 

Side by side with this movement for material equipment is an equally 
aggressive effort to raise up a trained secretarial leadership which shall 
be equal to this new responsibility. In order to increase the efficiency 
of the men who are already in the ranks and to train those who are 
coming into this new profession, an Institute is held each year for the 
training of secretaries at Arundel-On-The-Bay, Maryland. Last year 
thirty days were occupied with strenuous work by thirty men in study 
and conferences. This Institute is now a prominent feature of the 
work. A large number of influential educated colored men are answer- 
ing the call and accepting the challenge of this great opportunity. 

The industrial field has been entered and one strong Association has 

56 



been in existance for a number of years among the miners at Buxton, 
Iowa. This is known to many Association leaders as one of the most 
effective Associations of its kind in the United States. For a number 
of years special work has been done for colored men employed by the 
Norfolk and Western Railroad Company at Bluefield, W. Virginia. 

Bible Study is systematically pursued in a large number of the city 
Associations. Every year many colored men take the International 
examinations and win certificates. The Norfolk Association has now 
finished their third year of a four years' course and each year a num- 
ber of young men have been successful in winning certificates. This 
study has aided many Sunday-school teachers and has increased the 
efficiency of other lay workers in the various churches. What is true 
of Norfolk is true of many other cities. Religious meetings of a force- 
ful, sane character are maintained in all of the Associations. Many of 
them conduct educational classes, which has had much to do with in- 
creasing the wage-earning capacity of young colored men. The physi- 
cal work will be one of the most important phases of the Association and 
is constantly growing in magnitude. The problem of the high death 
rate of colored people and training which makes for self-control, are 
receiving more and more the serious and enthusiastic attention of colored 
men and boys. There is probably no race more inchned to athletic 
sports than the colored race. Athletic clubs, baseball, football, and 
basketball teams are springing up everywhere. The Association seeks 
to enter this field aggressively and direct these agencies so that they 
will contribute to the moral and physical welfare of the race. 

While the young men in cities and educational institutions have 
naturally and properly received first attention, the needs of the eighty- 
five per cent of the colored men and boys of the nation, living on South- 
ern plantations, have not been overlooked. The first County Associa- 
tion for colored men is now being organized, and will be in charge of 
a graduate of Hampton Institute who first completed a course of special 
training for this work. 

Colored men's Associations are usually organized in close affiliation 
with and often as branches of existing city Associations, and thus is 
secured the co-operation of active Christian men of both races in the 
solution of one of the most difficult problems confronting the American 
people. 

57 



\0. iSeligiou^ ?^orft 

BY its very nature the Young Men's Christian Association is a 
rehgious movement. Except in the case of a few Associations 
which maintained reading rooms, libraries and lectures, in its 
early days its work was strictly religious. The addition of social, edu- 
cational and physical activities was at first regarded by many as an 
indication of waning spiritual power. All so-called secular agencies 
were thought to be a menace to the spiritual growth of the movement. 
It took years of experience to make clear to many people that the physi- 
cal, educational and social activities could be conducted, not only with 
a religious motive, but also could be made positively advantageous in 
the development of the religious life of boys and men. 

The historical development of the forms of religious work which are 
still in operation in the Associations of North America now generally 
accepted as universial principles, was in the main in this order: (1) 
Prayer meetings for young men (1851), (2) Evangehstic meetings 
(1852-1860), (3) Bible study and Bible classes (1871-1874), (4) 
Personal evangelism and Training classes (1876-1880), (5) Mis- 
sionary activity represented in the foreign work (1886-1889), (6) 
Community extension, shop meetings, etc. (1899-1901). All of these 
had a place in the hearts of individuals and found some expression in 
isolated Associations at earlier dates. Many of the early methods have 
been modified or abandoned. Others have been enlarged. Religious 
work for boys has changed in many ways and in its chief objectives. 
But these main lines of activity with varying methods, adapted to dif- 
ferent groups are maintained and promoted with an ever increasing 
momentum. 

Any careful student of the history of the American Associations 
will note the period of rapid advance in the erection and equipment of 

59 



buildings beginning about 1 880. This coincides with the era of special- 
ization on physical and educational work. He will also discover a 
larger emphasis on the religious work beginning with 1897-1900 when 
religious work specialization became a fact. The employment of re- 
ligious work secretaries in local Associations was opposed for years by 
leading Association men, but no such opposition was met when the first 




High School Bible Class, Lexington, Kentucky 

suggestion was made to engage a man to become Bible study Secretary 
of the International Committee in 1897. Careful observers like R. R. 
McBurney, and Edwin F. See had discovered the signs of the times 
and had disclosed the fact that Association Bible study, and as a natural 
consequence, other forms of religious work for boys and men were not 
keeping pace with the growth in buildings and equipment, though not 
actually losing ground. International supervision of religious work began 
in 1 899. But a Religious Work Department was not organized until 
1 90 1 . Since that time the religious work has advanced rapidly in types 
and methods of work, literature of principles and methods, numbers of 
boys and men brought under the influence of the Christian religion 
through Association work, and in the results as shown in the numbers 
led to an open confession of faith in Jesus Christ. In fact, statistics 
show that the ratio in the growth of buildings and in the various forms 
of the so-called secular agencies, great as this has been, has been ex- 

60 



ceeded in the decade ending with 1911 by nearly every phase of re- 
ligious work. For example, the net property value of the buildings, 
equipment and endowment of the American Associations increased from 
$21,716,102 in 1901 to $67,539,475 m 191 1 , or 21 1 per cent. 
The total membership of the Associations increased from 268,477 in 
1901 to 536,047 in 191 1, or 96 per cent. The number of men en- 
rolled in educational classes from 26,906 in 1901 to 61,904 in 1911, 
or 130 per cent., and young men using gymnasium from 80,433 in 
1901 to 159,855 in 191 1, or 96 per cent. Compare these evidences 
of growth with the following table: 

POINTS OF ADVANCE IN THE 

Religious Work of the North American City, Town and Railroad 

Associations 

1901 

Number of volunteer workers, teach- 
ers of Bible classes, religious 
work committeemen, etc 5,328 

Religious work secretaries, local, 

State and International 5 

Number of different men and boys 

in Bible classes 1 9, 1 80 

(Student Associations not counted) 

Total attendance at these Bible 

classes 325,096 

Total attendance at shop meetings.. 75,000 

Total attendance at all religious 

meetings 1,91 7,08 1 

Number of men and boys professing 
to begin the Christian life as a 
result of Association activities. .. 7,750 20,549 165 

Amount contributed by the Asso- 
ciations for work in foreign mis- 
sion lands $35,000 $101,152 189 

61 



1911 


Per cent. 




of gain 


17,118 


219 


84 


1680 


73,850 


271 


987,286 


202 


1,191,386 


1488 


5,486,895 


189 



The methods of specific rehgious work now in vogue in the North 
American Associations may be roughly grouped as follows : ( 1 ) Bible 
classes, (a) for instruction in religious truth. (b) for training in 
religious service, such as personal evangelism and teaching of Bible 
classes, (c) For the proclamation of the evangel. (2) Personal Bible 
study, by the use of correspondence courses and special text books. 
(3) Evangelistic meetings for boys and men in Association buildings, 
and in churches, public halls and theatres. (4) Community extension 
meetings of many types in more than a hundred places, such as shops, 
mills, mines, street-car barns, fire stations, offices and homes to meet 
the need of the men who cannot or do not attend church, and at hours 
convenient to their period of toil. (5) Conferences and institutes for 
the training of leaders. (6) The use of literature, tracts, pamphlets, 
Bible courses. Christian biography, missions and social service. (7) 
Training in the principles of stewardship and the art of raising money 
for missionary purposes. (8) The study and illustration of practical 
forms of personal evangelism. Of course, not all of these methods are 
employed in every Association. On the other hand, some methods might 
be subdivided elaborately to describe the activities of certain progres- 
sive Associations in which there are upwards of one hundred Bible 
classes and meetings each week, calling for the service of one or more 
full-time specialists, and several hundred volunteer workers. 

What are the principles by which the Young Mens Christian Asso- 
ciations of America are guided as indicated in the published statements 
of Association leaders and the deliverances of International Conventions? 

1 . The Church of Christ is the primary and permanent agency 
for the cultivation of the religious life of the men of America. The 
Association is a secondary agency which the church herself, through 
her own representatives has developed to meet the demands of modern 
life. The Association does not exist for itself and is not trying to build 
itself up. Its efficiency as a religious agency is indicated by the 
measure of its usefulness to the church in conserving and training Chris- 
tian boyhood and manhood and winning boys and men to Christ and 
to membership in His church. 

62 



2. The Association, while Christian, is non-sectarian. In its re- 
hgious activities and its Bible courses and literature it stands for those 
interpretations of religious truth which are common to the leading evan- 
gelical churches. 

3. The Association increasingly regards itself as a clearing house 
and laboratory station for the churches of the community in work for 
boys and men. It avoids overlapping in its methods and puts primary 
emphasis on those forms of aggressive work which its inter-denomina- 
tional character gives it opportunity for doing in an unusual way. Its 
training classes for personal evangelism and Bible teaching steadily pass 
men back to the churches of the community. It conducts union training 
classes for men, because few churches are able singly to have such 
classes. 

4. The Association is chiefly concerned to reach such boys and 
men as are not now being adequately reached by the churches. Its 
largest field is the out-of-the-way, the careless, the stranger, rather than 
the young men who already have adequate provision within the program 
of their own church. 

5. The Association magnifies the church, seeks its honor, and 
counts itself happy to do many things for the church and for the young 
men in the community for which it neither asks nor expects public 
recognition nor approval. 

6. Representing as it does the evangelical churches of the com- 
munity, it avoids employing such methods or using such speakers in its 
religious meetings and class rooms as are out of harmony with the evan- 
gelical basis of its character and its avowed evangelical purpose. 

What is its unique field of service in the community, and on rvhat 
does it rest its claims for continued support and enlargement as a re- 
ligious agency? 

1 . It has a peculiar responsibility for the boys and young men 
who unite in its membership. Some of these join as Christians anxious 
to serve their fellows. But the large majority of its members join the 
Association because of its social, educational or physical advantages. 
With the rapidly growing number of modern buildings, many of them 
providing dormitory space for from one hundred to three hundred young 

63 



men, the Association has a field for religious service in the building re- 
garded by many of these young men as their home. To thousands of 
railroad and industrial men the Association has become their only social 
resort. Fully two-thirds of the six hundred thousand members are in 
need of religious help, which the Association is fitted to give. 

2. Closely connected with its membership are probably three times 
that number who might be called "near members" — young men wha 
are friends of members or on the way to membership, and in the way of 
invitations to its meetings and religious advantages. 

3. There are several great groups of men in industrial and rail- 
road pursuits, army and navy, and students in professional schools, wha 
are peculiarly accessible to the forms of religious work which the Asso- 
ciation can promote. 

4. Perhaps in no single direction has the Association so unique a 
field for religious work as among the usually neglected men in construc- 
tion camps, away from the restraints and privileges of normal community 
life, and this field it is occupying with ever increasing efficiency. 

5. With the rising standards for church boys' clubs and Bible 
classes, specially trained leaders are more and more in demand. Few 
churches can by themselves train such leaders in the most scientific and 
effective forms of boys' work. The Association as an agency of all 
the churches is equipped in most cities to render unique help in this 
direction. 

6. Quahfied volunteer male teachers for boys' and men's Bible 
classes in Sunday Schools are hard to find. In nearly 200 cities the 
Associations are maintaining each year classes of men in training, who 
represent the churches and carry back to them the results of the training 
received in the Association. 

7. Finally, as in the past, so increasingly in the future, the Asso- 
ciation will have a field for the illustration of practical co-operation in 
Christian service for men, especially in forms of religious work, which 
experience abundantly shows cannot be done effectively by individual 
churches or by denominations. As the Association illustrates the power 
of united effort, so by its inter-church character, it can inaugurate work 
and try experiments in lines of activity which few single churches could 
expect to establish and maintain alone. 

64 



II. oEDucational Wotb 

ASSOCIATION leaders believe in the American public school. 
The various facilities from the kindergarten to the university 
form the best educational system in the world. Best citizenship 
in America requires that every person should do his utmost to encour- 
age and extend the good work of all forms of educational privileges. 
Only as they can do their efficient work among all persons will America 
realize best dividends on this investment. 

However, notwithstanding all of this wealth of educational privi- 
lege, more than two-thirds of the boys leave the public schools before 
the end of the eighth grade. The average length of a boy's schooling 
is less than six years, and this training is taken before the age of twelve 
or fourteen, while the boy is too young to appreciate his loss. The 
boys leave school to help earn a living for the family, or because of 
the "call of the dollar," or because they dislike school. 

From authentic reports we learn that of one hundred boys in the 
first grade there are only fifty-five left in the fifth grade, twenty-eight 
in the eighth, six in the last year of the high school, and one to enter 
college. Of all the boys thirteen years of age and who certainly should 
be in school, less than sixty per cent of them are there. Economists 
and sociologists discover that of all the males in the nation over ten years 
of age only five per cent are fitted by definite educational training for 
their occupations or vocations. These and similar striking facts show 
the great lack of the adequate use of the vast wealth of American public 
school facilities by the boys. 

Again from Commissioner Draper of New York, we learn that 
among the voters of the United States illiteracy is more than four times 
as great as in England and Scotland, where the facts are based on 
records of marriage licenses; sixteen times greater than in Switzerland; 

65 



and two hundred and fifty times greater than in the German army. The 
present record shows that owing to the very large immigration during the 
last few years the percentage of illiteracy in the United States is slowly 
increasing rather than decreasing. 

From official reports of various national and state educational com- 
missions we learn that there are more than three hundred and seventy 



[--'^^■■■■■Kfllll^HHi 


IPBHIH 


^^HHpB^^ 


iWy^'- ■ 




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Automobile School, Cleveland, Ohio 

different kinds of professions, occupations, trades and vocations repre- 
sented in America. Definite educational facilities supplementing public 
school privileges have been provided to help men and boys prepare for 
life work in only a small proportion of these varied directions, while in 
some foreign nations the corresponding training facilities — commercial, 
industrial or technical — are many times greater than in America. Need 
for specific, timely, adapted, supplementary training in many vocational 
lines for men and boys in America seems to be many times greater than 
all kinds of constructive effort yet provided to supply such need. 

In view of the need to meet the demands of our present-day com- 
plex civilization there is great opportunity for the service of individuals, 

66 



of clubs, of the Young Men's Christian Associations, and of the church 
to help meet such needs by largely increasing all forms of supplementary 
facilities among men and boys and thus encourage, strengthen and ex- 
pand the helpfulness of the public schools. As the church through the 
past two hundred years, in all similar needs of men and boys, has so 
often wisely led in providing the necessary additional educational train- 
ing through college, technical schools and other appropriate features, so 
to-day its leaders through the Associations are striving to help meet this 
need. 




Applied Electricity Class, Seattle, Wash. 

The purpose in so doing is to develop Christian manhood; to help 
men and boys help themselves; to inspire them to higher ideals of life 
and service ; to acquaint them with and help them to wisely develop their 
own capabilities; to increase habits of industry and thrift; and to 
prepare them to render more easily, willingly, and effectively the highest 
type of industrial, social and Christian service. 

Association educational work thus encourages and strengthens other 
good forms of educational work; improves citizenship, commerce and 
trade through appropriate facilities offered at any time of the day or 
night; and places emphasis upon Christian character building as funda- 
mental. 

Many years of experience in an ever-enlarging program of practical 
educational privileges conducted either in the Association building or out- 
side of it to meet the needs of men and boys, show the following 
general divisions of privileges with their record in the same for 191 I. 

67 



a. Reading-rooms. The Association provides, cares for, and en- 
courages the careful reading of the best periodicals, magazines, technical 
and trade journals as are appreciated by men and boys. Nearly 1 ,000,- 
000 daily used these features. 

b. Books and Libraries. Stimulation in the reading of good books 
is increasingly developed. The working library for study and research 
is the centre of most efficient and permanent educational service. Pub- 
lic and private libraries are used increasingly. Seven hundred thousand 
good books were read. 

c. Educational Lectures. Formal, high-grade lectures for mixed 
audiences and with paid speakers of national reputation are promoted. 
One thousand nine hundred such lectures were given. 

d. Practical Talks. Informal talks or demonstrations are given 
by local talent to small groups of men and boys at any time or place, 
day or night. Six thousand eight hundred and fifty were given, at- 
tended by 416,000 employed men and boys. 

e. Educational Tours. Weekly or monthly trips to places of his- 
torical, social, industrial, scientific or religious interest are enjoyed under 
competent leadership. 

/. Educational Clubs. Many different kinds are promoted for re- 
search, study, discussion, reading and service. There are 930 such 
groups with 22,000 members. 

g. Class Lecture Series. Professional, semi-professional and vo- 
cational subjects for mature men are handled by experienced teachers 
and leaders. Tuition fees are charged which usually cover the ex- 
penses. This work when well done requires much reading, discussion, 
conversation and demonstration. Such courses include those in law, 
accountancy, real estate, advertising, salesmanship, fruit culture, credit, 
poultry raising, eugenics, and the like. Over 6,300 college men are 
students in such courses. 

h. Educational Classes. These include commercial, industrial, 
trade, academic, language and other grammar and high school sub- 
jects taught by experienced and successful teachers. The courses usually 
run during a three months' term of twenty-five sessions or during the 
entire season of eighty or one hundred sessions. Students pay tuition 

68 



fees of varying amounts, depending upon the subject and the expense. 
In elementary subjects the fee does not, as a rule, and should not, begin 
to cover the salary paid the teacher. In advanced and professional 
subjects such fees cover the expenses. Two thousand five hundred and 
sixty teachers give instruction in 120 subjects to 61,800 employed boys 
and men. The students paid $528,000 in tuition fees. 

i. Tutoring. In addition to the work in the classroom the Asso- 
ciation often arranges with teachers to help meet the individual needs of 
students seeking personal instruction. Such fees are 50c. and up per 
hour. 

/. Individual Altruistic Service. Aside from the above standard 
facilities, many Associations through individual and whole-souled Chris- 
tian teachers and leaders conduct unadvertised altrustic service in 
which each person gladly invests some of his time and effort with no 
thought of return, to help, to teach, and to be a real needed friend to 
some other person, similar to the spirit and practice of the Big Brother 
Movement. The amount of such service now rendered is very large 
and increasing, but there is an infinite opportunity for its expansion. 

k' Extension Features. Over one hundred Associations are help- 
ing to meet educational needs among men and boys outside the Asso- 
ciation building, using the above adapted features in various kinds of 
city centres as in shops, offices, stores, homes, clubs, rented hall, school 
buildings and other places. Over 1 00,000 were thus aided. 

/. Coming Americans. Many Associations are teaching non- 
English speaking males in commercial and industrial life to speak, read 
and write in English. As far as possible and by wise counsel and 
instruction they are led into intelligent American citizenship. Over 
15,000 students were thus aided. 

m. Day Privileges. In addition to the evening facilities a num- 
ber of Associations now conduct regular organized educational privi- 
leges in the daytime, including various kinds of schools, courses and 
subjects for males of all ages over fourteen. About 6,000 are thus 
enrolled. 

n. Among Different Groups. While the great majority of this 
supplementary practical educational work is conducted among city men, 

69 



yet there is a growing work with adapted privileges among each of the 
following groups of men and boys. Railroad, Army and Navy, indus- 
trial workers, country, colored, Indian, and college men. 

o. Among Boys. A large and growing movement with over 1 6,- 
000 boys already enrolled in definite evening class work is in operation. 
The employed boys who have so largely left the public school and 
among whom there is such need for educational training, form the largest 
single Association opportunity. Over 1 0,000 of these are now in our 
Association classes. About 2,000 boys are studying m Association 
camp schools and over 4,000 in vacation or summer schools in our 
Association buildings. 

p. Vocational Training. The subjects of industrial education, of 
continuation schools, apprentice schools, vocational guidance, etc., are 
demanding large and increased attention. The Associations find here 
a rare field for service, and are already making commendable progress. 
About 3,500 men and boys are in these various courses under Asso- 
ciation auspices. 

Although begun with the sole idea of benefiting men spiritually, 
the Association has gradually come to realize its opportunity and re- 
sponsibility to the all-round man — spiritual, educational, physical, so- 
cial, and economical. During the early years from 1 85 1 to 1866 there 
was little or no distinctive educational work. A few Associations like 
Boston, Montreal, and New York conducted reading-rooms, some li- 
brary work and a few lectures. This is called the period of opposition. 
Little was done educationally until after the first generation of its Amer- 
ican founders and promoters had passed away. There have been in- 
ferences that during these early years the zealousness of the leaders for 
the religious work, together with the fear that the so-called secular work 
might choke or destroy the religious, were so pronounced that they not 
only did not encourage educational work, but seemed to seek every 
opportunity to oppose and discourage it in the Association. 

Then came the period of toleration from 1 866 to 1 880, when 
some forms of educational service were tolerated but nothing encour- 
aged in this direction. From 1 880 to 1 893 was the period of awaken- 
ings and new interests. Some effort was made to encourage the work. 

70 



The new conception began to develop concerning the opportunity and 
responsibility of the Association to men and boys educationally as well 
as spiritually. From 1893 to 1900 is known as the period of encour- 
agement, when an increasing number of Associations began to plan and 
provide for the definite promotion of appropriate educational features. 
From I 900 to the present is known as the period of expansion. 

When the International Committee of Young Men's Christian As- 
sociations began to encourage, unify and promote this work in 1893, it 
was crude and superficial and the interest was indifferent. There were 
only a few courses and these mostly in commercial and language sub- 
jects and very poorly attended; only a handful of poorly paid teachers; 
little or no public respect and no encouragement from educators; but 
few students and those largely in the Three R's; it was regarded only 
as a side issue and not a part of the regular Association work; had no 
special provisions in buildings or equipment, and no tuition receipts. 

Now there are over 1 20 courses for men and boys, industrial, trade 
and vocational as well as commercial and language, and with more 
regular attendance than in public evening schools; increasingly favorable 
public respect and co-operation from educators ; nearly seven times as 
many regular students, including business men and college graduates, in 
addition to those in the Three R's; regarded as a vital part of Asso- 
ciation work instead of as a side issue; with large and specially de- 
signed buildings to provide room and equipment; and with receipts from 
tuition fees alone to provide 65 per cent of the expenses of a work 
fifteen times as large as nineteen years ago. 

With the growth of this educational movement there come large de- 
mands for competent and trained leadership. The annual expenses of 
this work now are nearly $800,000, with tuition receipts of $530,000. 
The problems of securing the 1 0,000 paid and volunteer leaders, ma- 
turing plans for meeting discovered needs, and co-operating with the all- 
round Association work require the highest qualities of an educational 
engineer. There are seventy Associations in each of which one or 
more men are employed, giving full time to supervising and promoting 
this work. There are 270 organizations in each of which there should 
be one or more such men. 



71 



\2. ^l)p^ical Woxh 

THE Young Men's Christian Association is not an athletic organ- 
ization and yet it stands as one of the foremost advocates and 
exponents of physical training. This was not always true, for 
in the early days of the Associations things physical received very little 
if any consideration, as such matters were thought to be outside the 
province of true Association work. 

This early conception was short lived, however, as the organization 
soon realized that young men in the city needed an opportunity to work 
off surplus energy, fill their spare time with attractive recreation and 
exercise their body, thus maintaining and developing the health and 
strength essential to modern business life. 

The one gymnasium of 1880 has become the 648 of to-day, with 
285,000 men and boys, under the leadership of Christian Physical Di- 
rectors, regularly making use of its magnificent swimming pools, large 
gymnasia, well-equipped athletic fields, summer vacation camps, etc. 

Great as has been the development in property, equipment and 
numbers of persons participating in the physical activities, they do not 
compare in importance with the constantly enlarging conception of the 
present and future possibilities of this phase of Association work in the 
development of the highest type of Christian manhood. 

When the Association opened its first gymnasium it was largely 
with the thought that it would attract young men away from certain 
objectionable places and pastimes to others amid wholesome surround- 
ings. It did, but it was soon discovered that physical exercise and 
bathing were of themselves beneficial. That they were definitely re- 
lated to health, strength, vitality, symmetrical bodily development, and 
that both bodily and mental growth and skill were stimulated thereby. 

To-day physical training is recognized as an important element in 

73 



all training, so that educational leaders of those physically, mentally or 
morally deficient make large use of it, thus greatly improving not only 
physical health, but neuro-muscular co-ordination and moral conduct as 
well. 

Association leaders now believe that physical training is proving an 
all-important and vital factor in Christian character training and the 
immediate future gives large promise in this direction. 

Perhaps the best contribution of all has been that of the Christian 
physical directorship. When this work began it was difficult to find 
even one or two Christian men who were qualified for such a position, 
but now there are 642 in the Association of the United States and Can- 
ada, and hundreds working as supervisors or instructors of playgrounds 
and of physical work in schools or colleges have been prepared for this 
service in the Association. 

The Associations have not only blazed the way as pioneers, but have 
created the demand and also furnished the supply of such men in large 
measure. Association Training Schools are unable to turn out men 
rapidly enough to fill the needs. On every hand is heard the per- 
sistent request from heads of universities, colleges, schools and play- 
grounds for a physical director with Young Men's Christian Association 
ideals, training and experience. 

This is true not only of the United States and Canada, but of 
China, Russia, Japan, South America and India as well. Thus is the 
fear, expressed by a few, that the gymnasium would secularize the 
Association forever set at rest. Gymnastics and athletics have been 
redeemed and have demonstrated that they have genuine spiritual values. 

The Associations, in the light of this fact, have played an important 
part in organizing not alone the Association Athletic League, but simi- 
lar leagues among the Sunday-schools, public schools, church clubs, 
and industrial plants. 

No more is the physical department of an Association limited to 
the dimensions of its buildings nor the size of its membership, but is all 
inclusive of everything relating definitely to the physical life of men and 
boys in the community. 

An International Health League is promoting health propoganda. 
A continent-wide swimming campaign has already been the means of 

74 



teaching more than seventy thousand men and boys to swim and steadily 
increases in momentum. 

The Associations are having a large share in the present national 
movement to redeem athletics from their commercial and demoralizing 
influences and socialize them on a high ethical basis. 

It is a question among thoughtful Association men whether what 
might be called the "by products" of the physical department are not 
of as much value as its main output. 




Gymnasium Class, Boys' Branch, Calcutta, India 



75 



13. Wntk Witt^ 25op0 

IN the early years of its history some attention was given by the Asso- 
ciation to mission schools for children, Sabbath schools, boys' meet- 
ings, newsboys' homes, "ragged" schools, and juvenile temperance 
societies. This was followed by a period of steady increase in religious 
meetings for boys and youths with a rapidly lessening emphasis upon 
the "ragged" schools, mission Sunday-schools, etc. But it was not 
until beginning with the decade 1 880 that the boys were regarded in 
the light of members. At this time the emphasis was changed from the 
rescue and mission features to a work more largely of prevention and 
training, and the physical and educational needs of the boys were seri- 
ously considered. 

By 1 890 the work for boys had grown to sufficient proportions to 
justify a careful tabulation of reports of work done by the various 
Associations. This annual inquiry in reference to the quality of the 
work served as a constant reminder of what might be done. This 
period witnessed a rapidly growing popularity and consequent extensive 
and intensive development in Association Boys' work. Separate Boys* 
Departments began to be popular; separate rooms were provided, spe- 
cial supervision and special activities for boys multiplied. 

The first separate Boys' Department was organized in Salem, Mas- 
sachusetts, as early as 1 869. The first complete equipment for boys* 
work was opened by the West Side Branch, New York City, in 1897. 
While the provision then made seemed elaborate, in a few years it had 
become inadequate for the growing work and inconspicuous from the 
standpoint of equipment. 

At the present time 350 Boys' Work secretaries are employed and 
there are upwards of 1 50,000 included in the membership, with at 

77 



least double this number being touched by the Association in an effec- 
tive way each year. 

Among the characteristic developments in the past decade have been 
the general raising of the age limits of boys, so that few Associations 
to-day attempt work with boys below the teen age, where formerly 
quite a generous proportion were doing work for boys, beginning as low 
as six and eight years of age. Where before, comparatively few boys 
fifteen to eighteen years of age were reached, now a large and increasing 
proportion of the members are in that period. During this time, spe- 
cialization has also come; work for high school boys, grammar school 
boys, wage-earning boys clearly differentiated, as is also work with 
equipment and work without equipment; work with boys in cities and 
with boys in rural districts. At this time, a more scientific point of ap- 




BoYs' Meeting, West Side Branch, New York 

proach to the boys' work question has developed, and the work of the 
specialist and of the expert is increasingly demanded. This has caused 
a change in the type of religious work, and while some of the more 
spectacular features have been quietly dropped, the fundamental Chris- 
tian education has been greatly developed. At the beginning of this 
period there were probably 150 boys' Bible classes, while to-day there 
are 2,500. Then there were about fifteen or seventeen hundred boys 
enrolled as students; now between forty and fifty thousand. Then it 



was a rare thing to find more than one boys' Bible class in a given 
Association, while to-day in some Associations ten, twenty or thirty 
such classes, some even as high as sixty, are formed. 

The growth of the boys' summer camp has been phenomenal, single 
Associations having conducted a score or more of boys' camps in a 
single season, and the remarkable development of the State boys' 
camps has made them conspicuous as models for the entire country. 

While in the early years the demand was almost exclusively for 
volunteer \vorkers, to-day the demand, while it has not decreased in that 
particular, is insistent for the trained specialist. Hundreds of men each 
year are in training for this work, both as volunteers and as paid 
secretaries. 




Boys from the ]\Iines, Members of the Ishpeming 
Association 

The older Boys' Conference has been a wonderful development. 
These meetings of older Christian boys in conference regarding the ex- 
tension of the Kingdom of Christ in their respective States is significant 
of the work which is being done at home by older boys for younger 
boys and by older boys for their companions. 

Almost universally to-day the Boys' Departments feel additional 
obligations for boys outside the Association membership. Groups of 
Christian boys from our membership are making themselves felt in the 
High Schools of the country; groups of boy members are being stimu- 

79 



lated to greater activity in their respective churches; secretaries of Boys' 
Departments feel that their obligation is to the boyhood of the town 
rather than merely to the boys within the Association. Boys' Work 
Secretaries are becoming conspicuous by their helpful contribution to 
Church and inter-Church Boys' Work, to school and interscholastic 
meetings, to development of such movements as the Boy Scouts, Play- 
grounds Work, Juvenile Courts, etc., etc. Whereas formerly the use 
of equipment was conspicuous in the Boys' Work, and while doubtless 
it will continue to be profitably employed, yet there has been aroused 
a new interest in work with boys without equipment, both in cities 
where Associations are organized and in smaller cities where the Asso- 
ciation is not at the present time equipped with any building whatever. 

This non-equipment work is largely a work through other agencies; 
the church, the school, the home, the playground, the juvenile court, etc. 
This is a type of work which depends entirely upon the personality and 
equipment of the leader. There are at least a thousand communities in 
North America, not counting the rural population, where secretaries for 
this type of work can be employed. The Boys' Departments now feel 
a greater obligation for the development of Boys' Work in individual 
churches than ever before. 

The Association to-day is taking a keener interest than ever before 
in the homeless boy. Homes are being established and conducted by 
the Association for self-respecting, homeless boys. While this may seem 
to some Hke a reversion to the type of work carried on forty or fifty 
years ago, a closer examination will show that this is not so. There are 
still hundreds of cities where this type of work should be developed. 

A great opportunity awaits the Association in connection with the 
high schools of the country. It is said that America is the first civilized 
nation to exclude religious teaching from the public schools. This 
throws a large responsibility upon the home and the church for religious 
instruction and the Association is desirous of helping to share this 
burden. 

The high school platforms the country over are open as never 
before to Association Boys' Work Secretaries who are welcomed alike 
by faculty and students as they speak upon great moral themes, and 

80 



also as they quietly organize or inspire movements for the betterment of 
the school. 




'WHAT SHALL 

IT PROFIT 

A COMMUNITY 

IF IT CAIN 

THE WHOLE WORLD 



AND LOSE 
ITS OWN BOYS 



81 



14* ^orh of t|)e|^ortl) American a^^^ociation^ iu 
foreign XanD^ 

ABOUT twenty years ago the united missionary body of Madras, 
India, presented a petition to the International Committee of 
the North American Young Men's Christian Associations ask- 
ing that there be sent to them an experienced Association secretary to 
make available to the church in that community the specialized service of 
the Young Men's Christian Association in helping meet the moral and re- 
ligious needs of young men and boys of certain influential classes then 
more or less inaccessible to the regular missionary approaches. After 
mature consideration this request was granted. Other calls of like 
unanimity voicing the judgment and will of the church on the mission 
field have come up and have been answered as resources permitted until 
at the present time 1 28 foreign secretaries are stationed in the following 
countries: Japan, Korea, China, Hong-Kong, Philippine Islands, India, 
Ceylon, Turkey, Russia, Mexico, Cuba, Porto Rico, Brazil, Uruguay, 
Argentina and Chile. Those who know the most about it estimate that 
a maximum staff of 200 secretaries of the right ability sent out and 
maintained by North America and working upon right principles will be 
sufficient to render the distinctive service requested. These principles 
are, first, that all Associations established on the foreign field shall be 
self-supporting apart from the maintenance of the foreign secretaries; 
second, responsibihty and initiative shall be laid as rapidly as possible 
upon native leadership. From the beginning all Associations are autono- 
mous. National committees are created for the promotion of the 
movement by countries. Native secretaries enlisted already are nearly 
as numerous as the foreign secretaries and their ratio of increase is more 
rapid. Third, each secretary sent out is located with great precision. 
The practice is to build up model Associations in the seats of commerce, 

83 



government and education and let the movement spread indigenously 
from such centres. To this end assistance is given in securing modern 
buildings to demonstrate and fix the types of work. The present operat- 
ing equipment of the foreign Associations exceeds $1,500,000. 

The policy of requiring self-support of the Associations accepting 



4fi<& 






Secretarial and Teaching Staff of the Shanghai Association 

the service of secretaries sent out and maintained from North America 
is now bearing fruit in the releasing of large sums of money in these 
foreign cities themselves. The Calcutta current expense budget for 1911 
was nearly $25,000, not including an equal amount turned over in 
the hostels, or dormitories. There has been raised in Shanghai for 
Association purposes during the past four years $112,500. Tientsin 
gave $30,000 for a building site; Kobe, $15,000, and Kyoto, $10,000 
for like objects. The Dairen, Manchuria, building was erected upon 
a choice lot in the heart of the city, donated by the Japanese administra- 
tion. The Maharaja of the Native State of Mysore, India, purchased 

84 



and presented to the Bangalore Association a tract of five acres ad- 
vantageously located for building purposes. The British government 
has shown like generous appreciation of the Association in Allahabad 
and in fact in every part of the Indian possessions, where the oppor- 
tunity has offered. Buenos Aires gave $ 1 40,000 toward the two 
buildings now being made available for that greatest city of the Southern 
Hemisphere. Mexico City provided $125,000 toward a building cost- 



Maharajah of the Native State 
OF Mysore, India, Who Donated a 
Five-Acre Site for an Association 
Building. 




ing $200,000. The government-owned national railways donated 
$30,000 of this. In every city receiving a building it is required that 
at least the site be provided for locally. 

Recognition of the value of the movement to establish the Young 
Men's Christian Association in foreign lands has been made from the 
beginning by high-minded statesmen familiar with conditions. Con- 



85 



spicuous evidence of this attitude was afforded by the Conference on 
the World Wide Expansion of the Young Men's Christian Association 
in October, 1910. Invited to address this gathering, President Taft, 
beyond accepting, dignified the occasion and purpose by tendering the 
East Room of the White House for the place of meeting. A company 
of more eminent eye witnesses could not be summoned than bore testi- 
mony on this memorable day to the contribution which the Association is 
making and should make to the Kingdom of God. They included, 
besides the President, General Leonard Wood of the United States 
Army, a former Secretary of State and two bureau heads possessing 
probably the most intimate knowledge of Latin America and the Far 
East that obtains in Washington. Bishop Roots of Hankow came from 
the General Convention of his Church sitting in Cincinnati to speak ten 
minutes. Dr. Ernest D. Burton of the University of Chicago, fresh 
from his exhaustive and critical investigation of the missionary enterprise 
in Asia in its educational aspects, corroborated and reinforced in these 
impressive words the case as presented by the foreign secretaries and 
others: "Nothing that has been said in this room to-day — and I have 
listened to all that has been said — has exaggerated in any particular or 
degree the value and excellence of the work which is being done by the 
Young Men's Christian Association in the East. In fact, I may add 
that half has not been told." 

Including amounts raised in the foreign countries, the fund to en- 
large the foreign Association equipment initiated at that gathering has 
reached a total of $2,000,000, which will provide for the erection of 
nearly sixty new buildings, not a few of which are now under construc- 
tion. Assured by the unreserved endorsement which the President's 
action carried with it and inspired by his example, public men of many 
nationalities have cooperated with the Association leaders in their own 
lands in meeting the terms by which their portion of the fund should 
become available. The Japanese Associations were expected to raise 
an amount, which under prevailing conditions would have been impossible 
without the active support of the prince of Nippon's financiers. Baron 
Shibusawa; the Imperial Minister of Communications; a former Ambas- 
sador to the United States: and the representative of the great Mitsui 

86 



house. Among recent substantial givers to India equipment are: Her 
Excellency Lady Hardinge (wife of the Viceroy) ; a member of the 
Viceroy's Council ; seven other government and army officials ; an Angli- 
can bishop; the chairman of a Chamber of Commerce; several mission- 
aries; two Parsees; a Hindu, and a railway company. The Association 
meeting in Constantinople, preliminary to enlisting moral and financial 
support was called by the United States Minister at the Embassy and 
attended by foreign diplomats and Turkish Parliament members, educa- 
tors, editors and business men. The Foochow campaign managers pene- 
trated the conservatism and wealth of officialdom and the gentry as well 
as the powerful business guilds. Of the $23,000 contributed, the gift 
without precedent was one of $2,000 by the group of provincial officials. 

In return the foreign Associations as never before are ministering 
to national welfare. A fine combination of forces effected what is 
probably Brazil's first public playground. The authorities of the federal 
capital tendered the park space and donated labor for installing the 
apparatus which was given by the leading foreign concern — the Rio 
Light & Power Company. Brazilian business men furnished over 
$ 1 ,000 worth of materials for construction. The Association gives the 
supervision of its trained physical director. The Prefect of Rio per- 
sonally attended the opening ceremony and provided the Municipal band 
for the occasion. 

Eleven physical directors either have entered upon their far-reaching 
and distinctive ministry in seven different countries or are under appoint- 
ment to that end. The meaning of their pioneer activities in most of 
these lands can be stated only in terms of the most optimistic prophecy 
sure to be fulfilled. The outreach of the Association's leadership 
in the Philippines has extended in two years beyond the building 
and foreign community to the government civil servants, the constabulary, 
the educational system and the athletic and play life of the Archipelago. 
Shanghai mobbed the Municipal Council's plague lecturer who sought 
to instruct the Chinese concerning preventive measures, but applauded 
the same eminent health authority when he gave the identical message 
from the platform of the Young Men's Christian Association, perhaps 
chiefly because through the Association had been made available the 

87 



only recreation ground or park for Chinese in the foreign governed settle- 
ments of 750,000 population. The Association is furnishing manuals 
on physical education for use by the Bengal Government and native 
rulers invite its agents to inspect the institutions in their principalities and 
prescribe for their physical betterment. 

This service to humanity done in the name of Christ, has not been 
performed at the expense of relating men and boys personally to His 
transforming power. Each year w^itnesses the turning of increasing 
numbers to inquiry and discipleship. From the hostels planted here 
and there among the thousands of tempted Japanese students, little pro- 
cessions of converts have moved steadily to the Church. The Bible 
study groups of the teachers introduced to secular schools by the Associa- 
tion secretaries in Japan brought out many inquirers from otherwise in- 
accessible groups. Tientsin's company of wills yielded to the sway of 
the Lord of life include a member of the provincial Board of Educa- 
tion. Eleven young men joined him in the baptismal sacrament, eight 
being members of the Bible classes. From Canton to Peking, George 
Sherwood Eddy reaped the harvest of years. His searching, uncom- 
promising messages were heard by as many as could enter the large 
halls used, chiefly from the government, student, official and commercial 
classes admitted by ticket. Hundreds remained to after meetings. The 
enrolled inquirers and converts aggregated 2,000 — in Shanghai alone 
more than 500, scores of whom are already baptized and in the Church. 
Seoul experiences perennial fruitfulness. The Bible study enrolment 
exceeds the total membership of nearly 1 ,200. Two new church con- 
gregations have been created largely from the Association's converts. 
The religious work department has a record of 1068 inquirers who are 
in all stages of the nurturing process from raw heathen to self-propagat- 
ing Christians. Shanghai and Seoul strikingly illustrate the meaning of 
the advance in the direction of securing better equipment, for these have 
occupied their buildings for several years past and arc therefore able to 
demonstrate with some measure of fidelity the distinctive Association 
mission to these lands. The three great requisites of an expanding 
National Church are self-support, native leadership and religious liberty. 
The call of the missionaries to the Young Men's Christian Association 

88 



contemplated the rendering of specialized service to this end by address- 
ing itself to the merchant, student and official classes. The stream of 
converts from the foreign city Associations into the local churches are re- 
warding the confidence of the missionaries. Likewise, the score of stu- 
dent camps or conferences in India, Japan, China and South America 
are arousing educated men of those countries to a livlier sense of their 
responsibility for the evangelization of their own countrymen. The 
North China Student Conference two years ago brought forth a Student 
Volunteer Movement for the Chinese ministry following sweeping but 
sane uprisings in some of the strong mission colleges under the leadership 
of Pastor Ding. In one Presbyterian institution 1 00 out of 300 students 
dedicated their life service to the ministry; in Peking University (Meth- 
odist Episcopal) 150 of the 400 men volunteered and in the North 
China college of the American Board at Tungchou eighty, or over half 
of the enrolment. The new movement is organically related to the 
Association National Committee of China which employs Mr. Ding 
as traveling secretary. In the pathway of his work in this capacity 
conversions and volunteers are multiplying by scores. Approximately 
1 ,000 students have thus far definitely taken the covenant. 

For the past six years the Foreign Department of the International 
Committee has endeavored to give Chinese students abroad a Christian 
interpretation of Western civilization. This program has been pressed 
with fidelity and energy, initiated originally at the request of the mis- 
sionary societies of China and carried on with their cooperation in the 
loaning of Chinese workers and missionaries. A compact and well- 
directed organization, known as the Christian Association of Chinese 
students in America, embracing scores of the choicest sons of China, 
is at work certainly leavening the body of several hundred future leaders 
of that vast people now athirst and drinking at American fountains of 
learning. Cooperation is also being extended to their fellows in Britain 
and on the continent of Europe. The Tokyo campaign waged on a 
larger scale for six years has never abated in vigor nor become barren. 
Few weeks pass without baptisms, and few of the thousands get back to 
China anti-Christian. Missionaries report that none such have returned 
to their regions. The southern and central provinces of China are prac- 

89 



tically governed at this time by returned students. It is heartening 
that every constitution proposed for the fundamental government of all 
of them has contained a clause guaranteeing religious liberty. 

The oneness of the foreign Association movement with the under- 
takings of the Church abroad has been the conception of it entertained 
by the leaders from the beginning. The recognition of this fact and a 
practical application of it was made in January, 1912, by the Annual 
Conference of Foreign Mission Boards of the United States and Canada. 
Several of the China Missions had represented to their respective Boards 
the peculiar adaptation of the Association platform and policy in the 
approach to government students and the inadequacy of the Association's 
forces to meet the situation at once so vast and urgent, and asked the 
Board to set apart some of their own workers to be associated with our 
regular secretarial staff, in order thus jointly to overtake the task. The 
following significant action, at the request of the Foreign Department, 
was taken by the body representing practically all the Protestant mis- 
sionary agencies in Canada and the United States. In view of the vital 
service which the Young Men's Christian Association can render the 
Church in reaching for Christ and for the Church the student class be- 
cause of its valuable points of contact with these students, its specialized 
methods and agencies, its expert experience and its interdenominational 
character, the conference recommends, that the Boards of North America 
working in China consider favorably this request and allocate for five 
years, twenty men of wide experience and knowledge of the language 
and of student life, coupled with evangelistic gifts, to work in conjunc- 
tion with an equal number of Association specialists to be sent out by 
the International Committee to overtake for Christ and the Church the 
great opportunity presented by the rapid expansion of the student popu- 
lation in the government and other non-Christian institutions of China." 

In the pathway of large material expansion, spiritual harvests and 
enlarging territorial borders, the year 1911 registered, not inappro- 
priately, the maximum increase yet attained in the sending out of new 
secretaries. There was a net gain in the foreign staff of twenty-five. 
The budget of the Department increased from $226,000 in round 
numbers, to $300,000, provided by increasingly generous giving on 

90 



the part of the North American Associations and their friends, and this 
in addition to the recent pledging of a building fund which doubles the 
property assets of the foreign work. Three years more might easily 
witness the entire requisite staff of foreign secretaries on the field, ex- 
clusive of those who will be required to fill vacancies. The seventy-five 
men yet to take their places at the front and the stewards of Christ 
who will make possible their going can never hope to look upon fields 




Association Building, Manila, P. I. 

riper than exist to-day. No consideration of prudence in administration 
dictates the departure of fewer than an average of twenty-five additional 
reapers a year for three years. The calls for them stream up insistently 
from those whom God has marked as His prophets and watchmen by 
many infallible proofs. Like these pages, they speak of the timeliness, 
the fruitfulness, the urgency of moving now through this agency to help 
the Church work out the purposes of Jesus for mankind. 



91 



\5. aronclu^ion 

IN the foregoing pages an attempt has been made to convey to the 
reader some idea of the magnitude and variety of the work for dif- 
ferent classes of men and boys which is being carried on under the 
direction of the Young Men's Christian Associations of North Amer- 
ica. The principal activities and fields of work have been covered more 
or less adequately. There are, however, other specialized efforts of the 
Association of which no mention has been made, among these being: 
The unique work which the International Committee is carrying on, at 




Association Club House, Gorgona, Canal Zone. 



the request of the government, in the eight Association Club Houses 
provided by the Canal Commission for the American young men en- 
gaged in the construction of the Panama Canal, and the work which is 
conducted for Indian young men in the principal government schools and 

93 



on the Indian reservations in the Dakotas and other western states where 
the Association has proven of real value in supplementing the great and 
important service that has for years been carried on by the mission boards 
of the churches. 

Perhaps no more fitting words could be selected with which to close 
this statement as to the field and work of the Association than the fol- 
lowing testimonies from men who speak from an intimate and practical 
knowledge of the Association : 



Senator Elihu Root : "While in these days of greater opportunity there 
is more danger than ever to the young man in business life, the Young 
Men's Christian Association is grasping the problem with a wonderful 
appreciation of conditions as they exist. It is guided by that supreme 
good sense which has not alone kept it out of politics and out of the 
doctrinal theology, but out of the cant and charlatanism which so often 
hurt efforts in the behalf of morality and Christianity, In the Associa- 
tion work there is an unassuming self-devotion and a feeling of brotherly 
spirit that goes from man to man. The Association seeks to open the 
door of opportunity in the whole world to the young man and to make 
him a good and useful citizen, a noble and forceful man." 

William J. Bryan : "Were I asked to give a definition of civilization, I 
should say civilization is the harmonious development of man mentally, 
morally and physically, and that the Young Men's Christian Association 
has more nearly approximated this development than any organized in- 
stitution that I know of, for it develops the well rounded, threefold man. 
No single word in its title is superfluous. The spirit of Christianity is 
behind all that is working in the Association." 

President Taft : 'The money invested in Young Men's Christian As- 
sociation buildings is invested well. We are fortunate in this day to have 
such an institution, officered as it is by men who know their business — 
the business of caring for young men and boys. Its general secretaries 
know men, what will attract them, how to deal with them. I do not 
know of opportunities for the investment of money that can afford safer 
and larger returns to those who in their investment would help their 
fellow men." 



Whatever measure of success the Association has attained, what- 
ever measure of confidence its work has called forth on the part of men 
prominent in business, educational, church and political life. Association 
leaders recognize that its splendid achievements are due first, to the fact 
that in all its efforts it has sought to be loyal to the church of Jesus 
Christ; second, to the fact that it has directed its efforts to the specific 

94 



task of helping and saving men and boys, and above all else has sought 
in all its work to honor Him whose name it bears and in the continuance 
of whose presence and blessing it looks forward to a future of increasing 
usefulness to the young men and boys of North America and of the world. 



95 



